The Flame of Day
by SilverDreamer-PhoenixotD
Summary: The more things change, the more things stay the same, and that goes double for the 'Neo Vongola Primo'. In the aftermath of the Representative War, Tsuna takes on an old enemy of the Vongola, and finds new allies and friends. Amidst it all, will he ever figure out who that man in the suit was? He'll just have to do it with his Dying Will. Post-Series. Cover Image by Wyrvel.
1. Sky Flames

_Cover Image created by Wyrvel_

 _A/N: Because as good as the ending was, especially upon re-reading it more recently, I still wish there was more. And it's not like there isn't more to be explored._

 _As will soon become evident, the first chapter takes place a few hours after the end of the series-that is, the end of the manga. Thereafter, there will be a three month time skip, to allow for setup of events yet to come. For right now, this is going to be a series all taking place within the same universe, chronologically given, in short arcs that will most likely be written entirely in advance of being posted. How far it goes...well, that depends on a lot of things, but I have a lot of ideas. Hope you enjoy The Flame of Day._

* * *

 **Target 1: Sky Flames**

"Neo Vongola Primo? What a laugh…"

Tsuna walked beneath night sky and streetlamps, getting a breath of fresh air. The chain on the Vongola Gear jangled as he walked.

"I think he's just being Reborn."

"Yuni? I thought you had already returned to Italy by now…"

She sat on the curb, her headpiece on her lap, her black hair down her back in a braid. Her head was slightly turned to look at Tsuna out of the corner of her eye. "Byakuran was heavily injured during the last fight. We want to make sure he's healthy enough to travel."

"Oh. Um…can I sit down?"

She scooted over so that Tsuna could sit on her right, between her and the lamppost. From this vantage, Tsuna could see that she had a wooden white-painted box on her lap, inlaid with intricate silver designs. There was an emblem that Tsuna couldn't quite make out under her hands.

"And then there was one," she muttered, one hand going to the empty ribbon still looped around her neck.

Tsuna unconsciously rubbed the ring around his little finger with his thumb. "I hadn't thought about that, but yeah, I guess so. The Pacifiers are being maintained by Bermuda, and the Mare Rings were sealed when the future Arcobaleno came to this time. And even the Vongola Rings aren't the same anymore."

"Checkerface—I mean, Mr. Kawahira—he said that the life of the world turned on the Tri-ni-sette. But now it's gone off-balance. I can almost feel it, the balance of power shifting in the world, right beneath my feet, tearing off to the side until I feel like I'll slip away."

"Yuni, are you alright?" He put a hand on her shoulder.

She closed her eyes and pushed his hand away. "Tsuna, you should know, before it's too late. What you see before you…I'm not real. Don't try and argue it, because it's true. I'm a ghost, or a wish, made real by the will of the Sky attribute of the Tri-ni-sette. And now that the Arcobaleno curse has been broken, there's nothing to bind me to this world. If the others…no, I can't pretend that some of them ever cared for me, but if Uncle Reborn had known, he mightn't have allowed you and Talbot to carry out breaking the curse, even if it was the best way to ensure no more lives were lost to it."

His heart was beating fast, and he was nearly sweating trying to keep himself from panicking. "But yours will. And I don't care what you say, you're alive and you're here beside me!"

"But my life won't end!" For all she had said, when Yuni turned to Tsuna, her eyes were full of joy. "Out there, there's another version of me, who won't have to be me. I'm a possibility that is no longer needed. I…she doesn't have to sacrifice her life for the sake of a future she will never see. She won't have to bring the people she cares about into a deadly competition for an empty prize. She doesn't have to be…"

"The Arcobaleno of the Orange Pacifier?"

"Yes. Yes. Whether she does something great, or is just happy…she has the potential to be someone else. Anyone else. She can be anybody, the girl coming into the world tonight. Her mother won't die from a curse. Her father might be able to be a father, instead of a defender." She took a deep breath, and adjusted her grip on the wooden box. The emblem was that of the tri-ni-sette—a rainbow, a clam, and the ocean set triangularly. "I can't let go of this world without being sure of things. This is one of those things." She lifted the lid, and inside sat seven rings with brilliant clear gems and intricately cut silver wings.

"The Mare Rings? I thought they were sealed…"

"They were, but that only sealed their 'miracle', to connect across time's horizontal axis. But they are still potent rings, capable of manifesting brilliant Dying Will Flames. They can't fall into the wrong hands, but I know yours are strong and capable. Will you care for them, Vongola Decimo?"

"I…of course I will, but, don't they belong to Giglio Nero? Gamma might be better to carry them…"

Yuni shook her head. "Yes, the Giglio Nero has always cared for the rings, but I won't be returning to Italy, and Gamma…it would hurt him, I think, to carry that reminder."

Tsuna nodded. "I get it. Then, I'll protect them, as well as I can, and the first chance I get, I'll return them to the boss of Giglio Nero." He took the box, and closed the lid. For all their brilliance, they certainly lacked that certain spark that they had once carried.

"Thank you. Thank you. Then there's just…I might be only a ghost, a living will, but can I ask you a favor?" Her complexion was pale in the moonlight, or maybe she was fading already. "By the morning, memory of me—this version of me, I mean—will have faded from this world. For most, it'll be like a far-off dream you had when you were a child. But even for all that, I know that with your will and strength, you'll remember me. So…if you ever meet that girl, who is going to be born into this world tonight…please…" She wiped at her eyes with the back of her hand. "Just…can you tell her…she doesn't always have to be strong? That she can be human. There's plenty of people who will keep her safe, but so few that'll tell her that."

Tsuna wrapped an arm around her shoulders, and she leaned into him. "As long as I'm around, she'll know it. I promise, Yuni."

* * *

They stayed like that for a long time. By the time the sun rose, Yuni was gone like the morning mist.

Tsuna still had a heavy grip on the ring case as he rubbed his eyes. It had been at least 28 hours since he had last slept, and in that time he had been struck twice with the Dying Will Bullet, but he only stood up and checked the time on his phone. "Still an hour until school starts…doesn't seem real to be going back to class after the past few weeks…and last night…"

He started to stand, bracing himself against the lamp post, when a black car with tinted windows squealed to a stop in the street in front of him. _Why's somebody out so early…oh. Great._

The door slammed open, and out stepped the prince himself. "I don't like seeing garbage left out on the street, I should take the head off the neighbors," Belphegor said, and cackled. The storm weasel sitting on his shoulder chittered in unison.

Tsuna only rolled his eyes, keeping the box stiff at his side.

"Now, now, don't go walking away just yet, I'm sure the boss wouldn't want to leave Japan without saying goodbye, isn't that right, Levi?"

The Lightning Assassin seemed to be of a similar mind to Tsuna—that is, that this was a waste of time—although he did have one of his lightning rods in the seat beside him.

"Ooh, whatcha got there?"

"None of your business." Tsuna slid the box into his pocket, while also grabbing his mittens from the other pocket and slipping them on.

Another car squealed to a stop behind the first one, and Squalo stuck his head out from the passenger seat. "Vraaaiii! Move your ass before I cut it off! Bel I swear—" Whatever he was going to swear was lost when he saw whose neck Belphegor was playing the edge of his knife across.

Tsuna could only sigh and close his eyes. _If I stay I might get shot. If I run I_ will _get shot._

From the back seat of the luxurious black car came first a shocking white lion with platinum armor on his head and neck. The lion came up to Tsuna in a few quick strides, baring his teeth and growling. Then came Bester's master, one hand on the pistol holstered to his hip. Xanxus' scars were heavy on his face, and the grin on his face sent shivers down Tsuna's spine as much as he tried to keep his cool.

"Xaaanxus, he has a toy and he won't shaaare~" Belphegor said in a sing-song tone.

Tsuna forced himself to meet Xanxus' gaze. That immense anger hadn't faded at all since the last day of the Ring Conflict.

"Well? Hand it over, scum." With a flick of his thumb, he released the safety on one X-Gun.

Tsuna unconsciously brushed his hand against his pocket. "No."

"I said, hand it over."

 _He's just looking for an excuse, I wish he'd just go away._ Tsuna felt like there was a fire chasing down his throat. "And I said, forget about it." He turned away from Xanxus and took a step back down the road. There came a _click_ from behind him as a bullet loaded into place, but the shot that rang out wasn't from the X-Gun.

 _Of course he'd be watching closely, he always is…_ Tsuna thought as the bullet caught him in the center of his forehead.

The momentum threw him backwards, and a jet of flame from his gloves spun him upside-down over Xanxus, grabbing the offending arm and twisting it around as he righted himself in midair and landed heavily. His Dying Will Flame sparked, and the backs of his gloves morphed into a roman numeral _I._ Xanxus yelled out in pain as Tsuna sealed his hand in a cluster of ice, gun and all.

Squalo yelled out and kicked the car door off its hinges. He leaped out, hooking his sword-hand into place as he went, and went for Tsuna's exposed back. Tsuna released Xanxus, dropped to the ground, and blasted himself away to the side. He skidded on the sidewalk and rolled over so he could catch himself on both feet and one hand, crouched low to the ground. Squalo nearly sliced his boss's arm off, and instead rammed him in the back with his shoulder as he pulled to a stop.

Xanxus pulled out his other gun and struck Squalo in the face with the butt of the pistol as he turned back to Tsuna. "Bester!"

The Liger's stripes came into thick relief as he pounced for Tsuna. Tsuna flew upwards on a jet of flame, just out of the Sky Lion's reach. _This is ridiculous, I need to get into a better position to fight in the air unless I want to fight all of Varia at once. If I can get moving quickly, I might be able to avoid getting shot._ Just as the thought came, Belphegor's wicked laugh cut through it.

"No running, peasant!" A pair of knives came off his fingers and through the air, and with a twist of his wrist they wound around his arms by the wires. A Storm flame ignited on his Varia ring and started creeping up the lengths of the wires. As Tsuna pulled on the wires, they cut through the cloth of his sleeves and started digging into the flesh of his arms without any hint of give.

At the same time a loudmouth down the road yelled out and a flash of blue cut across the wires, severing them cleanly. Levi had just gotten out of the other side of the car when a string of firecrackers tied together by the fuses landed at his feet and ignited.

Tsuna ignited a hard sky flame on his gloves and launched himself down the road, landing right beside his Storm Guardian preparing one of his bombs with the electronic cigarette between his teeth. "Thanks, Gokudera."

"Nothing to thank, Tenth! I am only doing my duty!" He tapped a button on the side of his glasses, and his storm flame shields came into position directly in front of them to block a massive bolt of sky flames from Xanxus.

Tsuna nodded as Yamamoto came into formation to his left, Kojirou sitting on his shoulder and Jirou at his heel, and smiling as always. "Never changes! What happened?"

"Yuni gave me the Sealed Mare Rings to protect, and Belphegor saw the box. Xanxus used it as an excuse to come after me." He yanked at the wire again. Gokudera looked over, pulled out a pocket knife, and sawed the pieces apart with a few quick strokes. "Thanks." He looked up then, and motioned for Gokudera to move the shields aside. "Xanxus, I'm not interested in a fight. Can't we just go our separate ways?"

Flames ignited in the hand that had been frozen, and the Zero Point Breakthrough ice exploded apart into fragments. "It's way too late for playing the peacemaker, trash. Bester—Cambio Forma!"

"Scatter!" Tsuna shouted, and his friends dove off to the sides while he shot into the air. Xanxus launched himself at Tsuna with twin shots from the Emperor Pistols and they collided in a burst of sky flames. Tsuna grabbed Xanxus' collar with one hand and landed a heavy punch in the other, and Xanxus fired both guns into Tsuna's chest. Even as Tsuna fell back, another pair of shots struck him in the stomach, pushing him back another twenty feet. Xanxus took careful aim and fired again with one pistol, keeping himself in the air with the other.

Squalo watched his boss's fight with a snarl. "Tch. The brat's lost his touch." He smacked Belphegor's hand when the prince started taking aim at Gokudera's head with a knife. "Stay out of it. No point getting caught up in petty squabbles."

"Don't talk about the Tenth that way!" Gokudera snapped. He shaded his eyes from an intense explosion now over three hundred feet overhead and getting further away. "He's been through the kinds of battles you could only dream of, long-hair!"

"Vraaii! If he's so important to you, your miserable little tenth boss, then why don't you go break up the fight?"

"Maybe I—" At that moment a stray fireball exploded at Gokudera's feet, knocking him on his butt. "…okay but I can't fly! Yamamoto, get up there and do your rain thing!"

"I don't think all the rain flames in the world could tranquilize Xanxus. Besides, Tsuna wouldn't be going at it if he didn't want to," he said, and laughed.

Gokudera raised an eyebrow. "Eh? Did you get hit in the head? The Tenth hates fighting, he only takes up arms when he needs to, not to play games with assassins!"

"Right, so, why would he be fighting Xanxus then?" Yamamoto shrugged. "And if Xanxus really wanted to kill him, why would he start with weaker attacks that he knows Tsuna can counter?"

* * *

As they spoke, Tsuna shot down the way two hundred feet and landed on the top of a pylon. His Dying Will Flame started to flicker, and as Xanxus fired again Tsuna caught the flames and felt a surge of energy as he absorbed them.

* * *

"So what, it's like a game?" Gokudera said, raising an eyebrow.

"Sorta, yeah, I think so. That, or Tsuna's just letting Xanxus vent his anger. It's better than him attacking somebody who'll die, right?"

Gokudera examined Yamamoto's facial features carefully. _I can't tell whether he's joking or not…_ "I'm still glad Reborn called us. Wouldn't want the rest of the Varia trash trying to interfere."

Yamamoto looked over his shoulder. "Um, they're still right there, Gokudera."

"Why should I care?" One of the storm flame shields moved into place behind Gokudera's back to block one of Levi's Parabolas.

* * *

Tsuna projected a sphere of sky flames, and a spark lit on the Ring of the Sky ver. X. "Nuts—Cambio Forma." He clenched his fists and broke through his own shield as his gloves transformed into elbow-length gauntlets fitted with rear-facing vents. He braced his right arm with his left and started to free-fall with his back to the ground. "X Cannon!" A pair of fireballs erupted from his glove and swerved toward Xanxus. Tsuna immediately threw his arms out to the sides to stop his fall. The fireballs swept past Xanxus and Tsuna used the moment to aim a swift chop at his opponent's throat, and in the next moment he felt a sharp pain and saw stars. A breath later and he collided hard against the pavement, his lungs burning for air.

The ground shook as Xanxus landed. He cracked his neck as he stepped forward, looking down at Tsuna. He raised his right-hand pistol, still covered in shards of ice. _Gotta move, but my body won't…_

Xanxus pulled the trigger, and blew a hole the size of Tsuna's head about a foot to his right. "Keh. The score is one-to-one." He turned, his coat flaring in the wind, and walked away.

Small hands lifted Tsuna up by his shoulders. "Boss, are you alright?"

Chrome Dokuro looked down at him with a violet eye full of concern. With her aid, Tsuna pushed himself into a sitting position, and she knelt down so that he could put an arm around her shoulders. He stood slowly, leaving a lot of his weight on her, but she seemed to barely register it.

"I'm fine, really. Thanks." She walked him to the side of the road, and he was able to sit down on a bench. Within a few minutes, cars from the morning commute starting coming down the road. The Varia's convoy came by, and they could hear them screaming at each other.

Chrome retrieved a length of bandages from one of her pockets, and with Tsuna's permission started taping up his injuries. "Boss, what did he mean by, 'the score is one-to-one'?"

"I, well, I'd assume that, he meant like, I won back in the Ring Conflict, but he won just now." _With a cheap pistol whip, too._

"He never seemed like the type to keep score."

"I know." Tsuna checked his pocket. The Ring box was still where he had placed it. "Thanks again, Chrome."

* * *

 **Somewhere in the Sicilian Countryside**

The placard on the door read 'Jane Doe', to indicate the woman inside who had been comatose for three months. Everyone who worked in the clinic dedicated to Saint Catherine knew of her; a woman who had been brought in, noticeably pregnant and very weak, whose only act was to speak an old child's prayer, before passing into a coma.

"Now I lay me down to sleep, I pray the Lord my soul to keep, His flame to warm me in the night, and wake me 'neath the morning Sky."

It had taken a week for everyone to learn of the events of the night, but it took only an hour for the news to spread that the Jane Doe had woken up and was in labor.

"Contractions are every two minutes," the obstetrician said, as a nurse guided the patient through her breathing.

"Come now, you're doing great," she said. "What can I call you?"

The sage with eyes as blue as the sky had sweat along her brow and her face was red from stress and she strained with every contraction. "Aria. Please, if I don't make it through, my child—"

"Miss Aria, was it?" said the obstetrician through his face mask. "On my life, I promise, you're going to be able to hold your baby in your arms."

"Please, just...if I don't, or if I can't, her name is," she said, and spoke a name she had heard in a dream. _My dear little girl, could we both live? Was that dream the truth? Did that boy find a way to free us of the curse?_

"Alright now, _push._ "

 _Now I lay me down to sleep…_

"It's a girl, a beautiful baby girl."

It felt like a dream as Aria took her daughter into her arms. At her mother's touch, her crying softened. Aria held her close against her chest, kissed her on the forehead, brushed her cheek with her thumb, and met her gaze as she opened her eyes for the first time. Aria wept tears of joy, and said "My dear little girl, my daughter, my life and love. My dear, little Yuni…"


	2. Summer Vacation with Shimon

_A/N: So quick clarification for timeline purposes. The series started in year 20XX, late spring, Tsuna had just started at Nami Middle when he met Reborn. He was 12 at the time. Going by the manga, mind you, some thirty chapters later was his 13th birthday on October 14th (even if the chapter took place on the 13th, Reborn's birthday). The Kokuyo Arc started almost immediately after the summer vacation of the year 20X1, again going by the manga. As after that we have no specific dates, and few specifics on the passage of time or the amount of time that passes between arcs, I'm going to sit here and pretend that about 7 months passed from the beginning of the Kokuyo Arc and the end of the series. So, for ages at this point in Flame of Day, Tsuna, Yamamoto, and Gokudera are all 15, Ryohei is 15 (turning 16 without fanfare in about four chapters because his birthday is in late August), Hibari is 17, Chrome is 14 (but in the same year as Tsuna because shenanigans), and Lambo is 6. Basically if you look at the wiki where it says their 'present' age, add one to it. Except the Arcobaleno, they're all one year old._

 _And here's the painful inconsistency. "But Phoenix, Tsuna was 13 when the manga started, not 12." Problem with that: he, and Gokudera and Yamamoto, would then be too old to be in what is effectively 7th grade for us Americans. So in my little universe, Tsuna was 12 when the series started, turned 13 shortly after, and was 14 during most of the series._

 _Third thing: Tsuna and those his age, plus Chrome, Enma, Shitopi, Kaoru, and Rauji are all third-year middle schoolers (9th grade, not 8th). Lambo is in half-day kindergarten. Everyone else is a first-year high schooler (10th grade). Even if Hibari and Adel should be second-year high schoolers, and Julie should be a third-year high schooler.  
_

 _Let's get to it!_

* * *

 **Summer Vacation with Shimon**

 _Three months after the end of the Representative Battle of the Rainbow, things have mostly gone back to normal around Namimori._

The final bell rang, and Tsuna jumped out of his seat and was the first one out the door, earning a yell from the teacher but at that moment he could not care less.

He skidded around the corner, falling down in the process but pushing himself up and keeping up running. He slid to a stop in front of the art classroom just in time to catch Chrome Dokuro coming out. With a big grin on his face he held up the crumpled piece of paper in his hand.

"Boss—oh!" She spotted the red number on the upper left corner and her face lit up. "An 80? That's wonderful!"

"It's the best score I've ever gotten on a midterm! And I couldn't have done it if you hadn't helped me, thank you so much!" He coughed and rubbed the back of his head. His face was quickly turning red. "Sorry to get so excited, it's just, I never would have thought it was possible, you know?"

Chrome adjusted her shoulder strap and started to walk forward, Tsuna beside her. "I'm happy I could help, boss—I mean, Tsuna." Her cheeks went pink at that.

"So, how'd you do on the test?" He tilted his head to look at the packet of papers she had in hand.

"Oh, you know," she said, quickly tucking them away in her satchel, but Tsuna just caught a circled "100" in red pen and a smiley face. "But I don't think I would have done as well if I hadn't been studying with you. So, thanks." She picked at the cuticle of one of her nails as they walked down the stairs. "Um, actually, I have to go this way. Kyoko asked me to try volleyball, and I need to make sure that Julie isn't hiding in the girls' locker room before I get changed."

"Oh." Tsuna briefly imagined Julie Katou getting chased through the school by vicious dogs or the bending spears of a khakkara, but couldn't bring himself to find it amusing. "Um. Well. Good luck. Thanks again, Chrome."

He looked down at his test again, and couldn't help but smile at the score. A small note beneath it read, in English, "Excellent progress, keep up the good work!"

"What's the stupid grin for?" said a shrub sitting next to the doorway. Tsuna didn't even comment on Reborn's cosplay, and held up the test. Reborn shed the plant disguise for his suit beneath it, and replaced his hat. He took the test and allowed a small smile. "Not bad. So that's what, a 73 average in English language?"

"Hey, it's passing isn't it?" Tsuna jumped back at the wicked look in Reborn's eye. "But I'll keep going on that, alright? Man, can't I be happy about one test score?"

"Hmph." Reborn hopped onto Tsuna shoulder. Tsuna grunted at the added weight, but knew better than to comment on the fact. "I suspected that her attitude would change for the better, but it seems that accepting Chrome as your full-fledged Mist Guardian has improved her mentality in more ways than that."

"Yeah, I couldn't imagine her being around for hours like she was this weekend, helping me study." Tsuna thought back to the events of the day several months earlier.

 _"_ _He's gone, and nobody knows where," Chrome said, clutching her spear with both hands. "Ken and Chikusa and M.M. got left behind, but I think they're going to be headed back to Italy, while Fran went with the Varia. And then there's this—he left it on his bedside table." She held out an open hand, and Tsuna carefully picked up the Earring of the Mist ver. X. "I'm sorry. It's almost certainly my fault that he's gone, that I was too attached—"_

 _"_ _Actually," Tsuna said, turning over the dangling pieces of the earring with his other hand. "It's not your fault, exactly, but I think it might be because of you, yeah._

 _"_ _When the two of you used Genju Mugaia, I could feel something in both of your flames. When I first fought Mukuro, his aura was black, but when you combined your powers, I could feel a change in it. Like your kind heart was affecting him. Mukuro…he's a scary person, yes, but I think there's a part of him, and maybe it's deep down, that wants to be good. That's why he left, and, it's why he left this." Tsuna looked up at Chrome. "If he intended to do wicked things, then why would he have left behind the Vongola Gear with all its power?"_

 _"…_ _Maybe you're right."_

 _"_ _I hope so. He's been through a lot in his life, and I want to believe that even a man like that could regret what he's done." He sighed. "That just leaves this. Somebody needs to carry it, I think. It's what feels right."_

 _Chrome bit her lip. "Boss…I know that I'm only okay at what I do, and that I'm not the best fighter or tactician, but…"_

 _He held out the earring in his open palm. "Would you like to carry it, Chrome?"_

 _She nodded. "All I have in the world is here. I want to protect it all, as the obscuring mist that creates from nothing."_

 _At his touch, she turned, and he pinned it onto her left ear. She brushed the piece with her fingertips, and the gem in the stud glowed with flame. When she looked up again, there was a fire in her eyes that hadn't been there before—or that Tsuna had never noticed._

"Since the semester is nearly over, your homework will be training today." Reborn snapped a bullet into the chamber of his gun.

Tsuna grabbed the barrel of the gun and pointed it away before Reborn could shoot him. "Ah! Actually, I have plans! Enma asked me to meet him over by the river after school."

"And it's just about five kilometers to the river. Perfect for a speed test."

"Fine, fine! But can I at least use the pills?" He grabbed the vial of pills out of his bag. It was labeled as a prescription headache medicine, but it was more likely to cause headaches than cure them. He grabbed two pills, set them on the back of his tongue, and braced himself before forcing them down. He involuntarily clenched his muscles, and his airway seemed to seal up for a moment before a flame ignited on his forehead. Energy rushed into his limbs, and his lungs could draw breath even more effectively. He could perceive the energy of those around him, and feel their presence from the sound of their footsteps, whispered words, their breath and the way the air moved around them.

Reborn pulled out a stopwatch. "Go."

* * *

At 5 and a half km, Tsuna's shoes were warm from friction. Reborn's hair was even more frazzled than usual, having been clinging to Tsuna's shoulder as he ran. He hit the timer as Tsuna's flame went out and the young boy clung to the handrail of the stairs leading down to the river.

"Twenty-two minutes, that's four minutes per kilometer. Considering how short your legs are that's an impressive feat."

"I feel like my feet are going to fall off," Tsuna grunted. He forced himself to walk down the steps, punctuating each movement with "Ow, ow."

"Tsuna!"

"Oh, Enma!"

There were bags under the eyes of the Shimon's Tenth, and his breathing was labored as he ran down the road toward the stairway. He flicked his hand, and the flames that had been ignited on his ring petered out. "Thanks for coming. Oh, uh, hello, Reborn," Enma said, wincing in fear of Reborn punishing him as he so often did to Tsuna, although he hadn't actually done anything of the sort in over a month.

"Wait, Enma, did you just fly over here? And where have you been? I missed you in class."

Enma waved to try and slow down the questions, and started digging around in the messenger bag at his hip. "Sorry, just taking care of some things. And actually, that's kinda related to why I wanted to talk to you. So, um, I guess…" He scratched the back of his head as he slowly walked across the wet grass at the bottom of the stairs. "I was wondering—do you have any plans for summer break?"

Tsuna was momentarily stunned. "Oh…to be honest, I wouldn't have remembered it was a thing if you hadn't brought it up. So, no, not that I know of. Why?"

Enma picked at the bandage on his cheek. "Well, I um, I guess, I wanted to invite you—and by you, I mean you and Gokudera and Yamamoto and Chrome and Sasagawa and Hiba—" He twitched involuntarily. "Okay, maybe not him, but you and everyone else and your families, to come visit the Shimon Island over break? The beach on the south side is pretty nice and Rauji has been landscaping it so that the sand is really soft, and me and Julie and Shitopi-chan have been working hard to renovate a lot of the house or block off dangerous areas, the house is being called Cozarto's Manor—you know, like a combination of Cozart Shimon's given name and my family name? Koyo started calling it that as a joke but it's just kinda stuck, and Koyo's been clearing out the walkways of foliage and cleaning it up. But I understand if you think that's weird, I'm sorry, it was just an idea but I understand if you'd rather stick around Namimori for break."

"I think that sounds great, Enma," Tsuna said, a big grin starting to appear across his face. "I'd really like it, I bet the others would too! Yamamoto and Ryohei both like the beach, even if Ryohei is horrible at swimming still, and I'd be happy to help with anything from the renovations if I can do anything. And if food is an issue, Yamamoto's dad makes amazing sushi and my mom is a great cook too."

Enma's eyes lit up. "Great! I can't wait to tell everyone! And like I said, you can invite your families too, and for you that means the um…um…"

"Freeloaders," Tsuna said dryly, while pointedly looking at Reborn scratching Leon's head and pretending that he wasn't listening.

"…I was going to say houseguests. But, um, I-Pin, and Lambo, and all of them can come. But only if they want to, you know? But, yeah." Enma smiled big, and had a dreamy look on his face.

* * *

One week later, Tsuna, Reborn, Nana Sawada, I-Pin, Bianchi, Fuuta, Lambo, Gokudera, Yamamoto, Ryohei, Kyoko, Haru, and Chrome were running off the sailboat the _Earthfall_ , accompanied by Enma, Adelheid, and Koyo, onto the floating wooden dock on the south side of the island.

Tsuna hefted the suitcase that he and his mother had shared out of the hold and carried it over to the dock. He looked up at the island and sighed. _I was a little worried that this place might just hold horrible memories, but even the atmosphere has changed. Is it because it's summer? No…it's because this time it isn't a battleground._

Fresh paving stones had been laid on the path, leading up to a staircase to the Cozarto Manor in the cliff. Lanterns had been set on pedestals that had been empty, and wires running from one to the next indicated that it was electric.

"Tsu-kun! Bring my bag over here, we're all going swimming!"

"Mom, shouldn't we at least take everything up first?"

"Swims swims swims!" Lambo called out, already stripping off his cow print coveralls, pulling off one of his horns in the process and leaving the other one dangling from his hair.

"Stupid cow, you disgrace the Tenth running around like that!"

Kyoko walked past Tsuna, laughing at it all. "This is going to be great, I can already tell. Thanks for inviting everyone, Adel-senpai. Come on, Haru, Chrome, we can hold up towels for each other to change."

Tsuna went red in the face at the mere thought.

"Hurry it up, No-Good Tsuna, a boss must carry the weight of his family on his shoulders." Reborn threw another bag than Tsuna just barely avoided dropping into the water.

"Wouldn't a boss have somebody to carry luggage for him?" Tsuna muttered. Koyo tossed a third bag at him, and Tsuna started moving before he started dropping them.

Kyoko and Haru had packed their swimwear into a smaller bag, having predicted that they would be getting into the water straight-away. Chrome and Haru each held up a beach towel on either side of Kyoko so that the red-haired girl could slip her pink swimsuit on. Haru took her turn next, and came out in a one-piece decorated with cartoony Japanese monsters.

"Your turn, Chrome," Haru said, taking the towel from her.

Chrome hugged herself. For once, she wasn't wearing a school uniform, but instead a white dress with sequin ornaments that she had bought when Kyoko and Haru had insisted that she get some more clothes. The dress had come from a thrift store, and Haru had added the sequins to it in an afternoon. "Actually…I'm sorry, but I don't really feel like swimming."

"Hahi? But Chrome, that's why we're all here? Why not? Are you sick?" Haru said with genuine concern.

"Leave her be, Haru, it's Chrome's own business if she doesn't want to go swimming," Kyoko said. "Come on, we can still lay out, play volleyball—oh, I should have brought watermelon, we could have played Suikawari!"

Chrome smiled, unconsciously putting a hand to her chest where a surgical scar was still noticeable. She pulled a lock of hair behind her ear, and said "I think Takeshi might have brought some watermelons. I can go check."

"Nah, nah, we can wait until the boys get back," Haru said, waving it off. "I just want to lay down on my towel in the warm sun for now." She threw her towel out on the sand, and fell back onto it. "Ah…"

Kyoko took the space right next to Haru with her own bright pink towel, and Chrome breathed in the warm salty air. She pulled her hairpiece out to let her hair fall flat, and sat down on her towel.

"It's days like this you can almost forget the weirdness of everything," Kyoko said. She closed her eyes.

"I don't think it'd be nearly as great if it weren't weird," Haru added. "Weird brought you guys into my world, you know?"

Chrome thought of misunderstood introductions, green mind worlds, a boy running rampant with his Dying Will, and the strange people that Nagi would have never imagined existed. "Mm-hm." The summer air was warm over her face.

* * *

Tsuna and Enma stepped in the door, and a bouncing ball of eccentricity leaped across the room and grabbed Enma in a hug.

"Enma, I can't stand being apart from you for even a day!" Shitopi said. Enma squirmed to get out of her arms. "I'm so worried you'll hurt yourself, you're such a klutz!"

 _What a compliment._

"It's okay, Shitopi-chan, we're all fine, see? Adel wouldn't have let anything happen, anyways. Koyo might, but Adel wouldn't have put up with it," Enma said, his gaze going to the side as he considered it. She kissed his cheek, dropped off of him, and whirled away.

With the Swamp Guardian off doing her own thing, that gave Tsuna the chance to take a look around the entrance hall. The building had a wooden exterior and floors, but the walls were quarried stone. Off to the left and forward were hallways to the rest of the manor, while the entry room was offset from the front door (which had no traditional lock, but instead an inset to allow it to be opened with one of the Shimon Family Rings, though Enma had assured Tsuna that there was another door with a proper lock further along the path). Off to the side was a fireplace, empty, and a wide window looking out to the south. The wall over the fireplace was bare.

"Still a little—a lot—dusty," Enma said. "There wasn't any usable furniture left, besides the stuff in the dining room. If you go down the north passage, watch your footing, it's a little insecure. I had to pull out some rotten boards and there's a twenty foot fall to the ground."

"That's less insecure and more disaster waiting to happen," Gokudera said, grunting as he lifted Bianchi's bag over the threshold. "Why does she need so much stuff for a few days," he muttered, for the tenth time.

"There's twenty bedrooms we've excavated—um, actually, thirteen—but I can sleep in somebody's else's room while you're here," Enma muttered.

"It's fine, we won't kick any of you guys out of your rooms," Tsuna said.

"Mm. Oh, also, there's another room I haven't been able to get to yet, but you can take a look if you want. It's the room that Vongola Primo was given the couple times that he visited." He scratched the back of his neck. "I did a lot over spring break. Haven't been able to do much since."

Shitopi reappeared, grabbed Gokudera by the wrist, and pulled him along, Yamamoto following laughing.

"Hey, um, Tsuna? Could I talk to you for a minute? Or more, it could be," Enma said. He helped Tsuna carry the bags to a sitting room, and led him to a room deeper in the manor. The door had no doorknob, but instead an indent with an emblem matching Enma's ring. With practiced movements, Enma pressed the face of the ring into the indent, and the mechanism clicked into place. The door swung open to a study with a fine desk and another fireplace, and empty bookshelves along the walls. In contrast, the desk was covered in papers.

"This is Cozart Shimon's…I mean, my study." Enma nervously shuffled papers on the desk.

"This is neat," Tsuna said, and started beating himself internally for that being the first thing he could think of. "So, what did you need?"

"Need? Nothing. But…okay, so, you know back during the incident around the Inheritance Ceremony?"

"Of course, I couldn't forget, but I've told you before that it's all fine."

"But that's just it, it's not fine." He rubbed his forehead. "Conflicts turn to grudges turn to feuds, and feuds are the last thing I want for my family. But the things we did. Not just to you and your family, but to a lot of people, affected a lot of people. The Vongola Ninth's right hand, who I attacked personally. Apparently he survived, but he's retired permanently."

"Right, Coyote Nougat," Tsuna said, recalling the old man with silver hair and a prosthetic arm.

"Right. And Vongola Ninth, he would be completely within his rights to demand my head, but he didn't, both he and Coyote Nougat forgave us after learning what happened, which I still don't get. I can understand Giegue's reaction a lot better."

"Wait, the Russian Assassins?"

"Siberian, and they're not just Assassins, but yeah. Adel…she killed the three representatives who came to the ceremony on behalf of Alexsandr Giegiov. And a few months ago, Giegue sent a message to be delivered to 'Shimon the Tenth'. That's the title I claimed for myself, anyways." He picked up a letter from the top of the stack, replete with a wax seal. "It was in Russian, but Shitopi translated it. It's an ultimatum." He set it in Tsuna's hand. He couldn't begin to read the Russian text, but he could pick up that the signature at the bottom was scribed with dark red ink—if not blood, then meant to invoke it.

"Enma, if they're looking for blood, then I'll stand right beside you! They have to understand that it wasn't your fault, it was Daemon Spade's machinations!"

"And who's going to believe that!?"

The furniture in the room jumped and fell back down. Enma extinguished the flame that he had unintentionally lit on his ring.

"You and I, the Vendice, our families, and Reborn all saw his ghost with our own eyes. We know what he did. But who else is going to believe that the ghost of the First and Second Generation Guardian of the Mist appeared before us? Even Vongola the Ninth…if Reborn hadn't seen it and testified to the truth, would he have believed your word, Tsuna?"

Tsuna narrowed his eyes. "I…would think so, yeah. He knows that the world isn't always what it seems." But there was still some seed of doubt that Enma's words had sown.

"At any rate…it's a choice." He sighed. "Give up the killer, or pay damages to the Giegue Organization. It would be higher if the representatives had had families, but it was just them, so it's what they claim was the cost of training three assassins."

Enma took a deep breath, and named a figure that made Tsuna do a double take. "So…yeah…"

"Yeah."

Enma nodded, and ran a hand through his hair, mussing it up even further. "So…not much of a choice, no matter the figure, right? Right. But then how do you pay that kind of figure? Well…actually, Shitopi-chan has been the main source for making it so that all of us could be, um, fed, and clothed, mostly through real estate, which means that she has credit, which means that she is able to get a loan for that kind of amount. But how to pay that loan back? Well…so…" He took a deep breath again. "I'm sorry, I'm afraid of what you might say. You know some of the work that Dr. Verde does?"

Tsuna's head snapped up, and he met Enma's eyes.

"Like…the work that Dr. Verde and his partners did in the other future. Him, and Koenig, and Innocenti. Well…they're trying to produce box weapons in this time. And we—all of us, me and my family—are in talks to invest in their work."

"…Oh."

 _Shimon Industries? Shimon Security?_ Tsuna had a sudden mental image of Enma doing a demonstration of a Box Weapon Missile System in the middle of the desert. _Okay that's a little unrealistic but no!_ "I…an arms…isn't there any other way?"

Enma backed up a step. "I mean I guess maybe yeah? But we also know that it works in theory, and the terms of the investment puts the production into the Shimon Corporation's hands—the name was Julie's idea—and they're already making some prototypes right, like the ones that Team Yuni and Team Mammon used during the Rainbow conflict, they just haven't worked out mass production yet. Maybe I'm just making excuses for myself because I know that it isn't what my dad would want, but maybe we could keep it from going out of hand, and from going into the hands of dangerous people. More dangerous people, I mean."

"But you…wait…" _His dad?_ "Your dad? He was…the Ninth, right?"

"…" Enma held one wrist with the other hand so tight his knuckles were turning white. "Who knows?" He was shaking from anxiety. "I called myself the Tenth because I thought it sounded good. But the first was my great-great-great grandfather, you could say I'm the tenth, the sixth, the second, it doesn't matter. But my dad…he wasn't anything like this. He was an art dealer. But he never wanted to take it to anything big. He just wanted to provide for us. For me, and my mom, and Mami, and my friends' families. What would he say if he saw that I was becoming…an arms dealer?"

Tsuna could hardly believe what came out of his mouth next. "I've…done some things to protect my friends, that if you told me about it two years ago, I would have wanted to die to keep from becoming that person, even if I don't regret any of it now." _He doesn't want to do it any more than I want him to do it, but he also believe that it's the best way to protect his friends._ "I'm…I'll support you, and the rest of Shimon."

"…Thank you, Tsuna."

Enma walked away sweating, leaving Tsuna behind, who had no idea how in the slightest to navigate the manor.

"Hm, maybe you'll make a decent boss yet," said the tutor in swim trunks in the doorway.

"Not now Reborn. Aren't you supposed to be out with the others?"

"I don't swim."

"That's a lie and we both know it! Ugh." Tsuna took a seat in the chair at the desk and planted his forehead into his hands.

"It's amazing, really, No-Good Enma might have the determination to break the Shimon Curse."

Tsuna blinked, but didn't move his head. "The what?"

"The Shimon Curse." Reborn hopped up on the desk with a 'hup', and picked up one of the financial documents, this one written in Italian. "Since the first generation family, the Shimon has been unable to achieve financial security. Investments fall through, partners are ruined, and those few who do achieve some measure of prosperity befall tragedy. So either the Vongola obtains a financially strong ally, or Verde is left working as a science teacher at a high school just to be able to eat. It's a win-win."

Tsuna lifted his head to look at Reborn. He snapped the financial document out of his hands. "Stop that! Agh, what am I supposed to do? I told Enma that I supported him, and it makes sense to try and get a handle on box weapons so they aren't proliferated as much, but it still doesn't feel right."

"Then ask your advisors if you don't know." Reborn had started looking at a different financial paper, this one in English.

"Advisors? I don't have any—well, wait, what do you think, Reborn?"

"I think I'm against anything that could serve Verde's interests, but I wasn't referring to myself."

The door slammed open even wider, and Tsuna spun around and nearly groaned at the sight of Gokudera and Yamamoto trying to squeeze into the room simultaneously.

"Oi, Baseball-Idiot, outta my way!"

"If you hadn't been so hasty you wouldn't have gotten stuck!"

"Only because your legs are too long and you move too quickly!"

 _And so…_

Relocated to one of the guest rooms, Tsuna finished explaining the situation. Both Gokudera and Yamamoto were deep in thought. "Please, just give me your honest thoughts."

"It could be asking for trouble, to risk development of box weapons in this timeline," Gokudera said. "But they've already started appearing, too, they just can't be mass-produced—probably too finely tuned to their owners' flame signatures. Varia had the same ones they had in the Future. And that would also explain how those assholes got the External Carnage Boxes, and how Gamma had the Nero Volpe. If those scientists have already gotten that far, how long could it be before they can mass-produce them?"

Yamamoto shrugged. "Well, if it's going to be anyone, I think Kaoru and the others are good to be in control of it. Even when Daemon Spade was manipulating them, it was playing on their own sense of morality and righteousness. That the Vongola Primo had committed a Sin against them and they were exacting justice."

"And then there's a lot of organizations I've encountered that I wouldn't trust with that kind of power," Tsuna said. "The Ninth told me about how he thought I could pull the Vongola out of its dark past and into a new era, as though he couldn't, because he's too old or too entrenched in that darkness. And me…I mean, I wouldn't trust myself with something like that, I'd wimp out at the first sign of trouble. But Enma, and Adelheid, Rauji, Kaoru, Koyo, Shitopi, and Julie, their resolve is amazing."

"Whatever decision you make I will stand beside you, Tenth!" Gokudera said confidently.

"Same, same," Yamamoto said with a smile.

Tsuna smiled, but that fell away when he looked over at Reborn, who seemed unimpressed at the decision. A frown, no more than ever, his hands in his pockets and eyes narrowed in thought.

* * *

An hour later, following the path to the beach, Tsuna was still thinking about it. _He said advisors…now that I think about it, they really aren't? Like…right, dad is one of the Ninth's advisors, on issues outside the Vongola, and they aren't friends, really. And I know that dad respects the Ninth, but he also doesn't say things like 'I'll stand beside you no matter what'. Shouldn't an advisor be someone who can say 'no, you're wrong' without being obstructed by thoughts of friendship?_ He smacked himself on the side of the head. "Agh, what am I doing, thinking about this? I'm not going to become the Tenth Boss or Neo Vongola Primo or anything even remotely close to leadership. If I'm lucky I won't still be living at home like a shut-in when I'm 25." He sighed. _I guess…gut feeling? Gut feeling…watch and wait, I guess, and act if something goes wrong._

* * *

 _A/N: Next time, Summer Vacation with Shimon Part 2: The Daring Conclusion!_


	3. Summer Vacation with Shimon Part 2

_A/N: More babbling about timeline? Shorter this time, how about. The Vongola Family is about 150 years old. Not 400. Because for that to be possible, Iemitsu Sawada and his predecessors would have to each be 80 years old when their first son was born. Which is absurd. Additionally, the Sicilian Mafia only appeared in the late 1850s-1860s, during Italian Unification. Also G supposedly used a gun, and easily reloadable revolvers were not common until the mid 1850s, thankya Smith & Wesson. Accordingly I reorganized the Vongola side of the family tree, it's not son follows father. For example, the Second is the First's younger brother, and the rest of the Italian side of the Family is descended from Ricardo._

 _This is a series about a kid getting superpowers and running around in his boxers with his hair on fire after getting shot in the head. I shouldn't be thinking about it this much._

 _Thanks to everyone reading, and cheers to my first story follower :) Enjoy the stunning conclusion to Summer Vacation with Shimon._

 **Summer Vacation with Shimon Part 2**

The game of watermelon-breaking went interestingly. Tsuna succeeded in putting a slight dent in the surface of the watermelon using a wooden baseball bat, earning him 0 points as judged by Reborn. Kyoko had been put on the same watermelon right after him and had split it from there for 60 points.

Koyo had removed his glasses and tossed the watermelon into the air to spike it, splitting it evenly along a fault line into quarters, but in the process had gotten half of it covered in sand and inedible. 20 points. Then everyone remembered that Koyo was able to see through the blindfold if his glasses weren't on, and he had been disqualified and buried in sand up to his neck for punishment. Zero points.

Gokudera had gone next, but instead of using a bat he stuck a small piece of dynamite into a hole he had carved out, and the resulting explosion rent the watermelon into a thousand tiny pieces and rendered it completely inedible. Zero points.

Rauji went next and split the watermelon into nearly perfect halves, and was awarded 90 points. He probably would have won, except that it was then that Adelheid brought out a rulebook from the Japan Suika-Wari Association, which ruled that for an official game of Suika-wari the judge was required to have eaten at least ten watermelons during the previous year. As Reborn had eaten no watermelon, ever, he was replaced with the only two of the number who had eaten that much watermelon: Lambo and I-Pin.

Lambo's first and last act as tyrannical judge had been to increase Rauji's score to 100, as a reward for his loyal subordinate. I-Pin had accordingly given a score of 80, which averaged with Lambo's score had brought it back down to 90. Lambo had then pulled out a bundle of dynamite he had taken off of Gokudera and everybody hit the deck while Tsuna took care of the explosives and Lambo immediately fell asleep afterwards.

Next Bianchi had taken a turn, splitting off a chunk of watermelon that got her 30 points, but nobody wound up eating it as at her touch it had started rotting instantly.

Kaoru took the bat next and a fresh watermelon was split into an even two halves at his swing. After careful examination, I-Pin declared that he received a perfect score of 100.

Then Nana Sawada had come down with Yamamoto carrying a bag of sushi and asked for a turn. At her easy swing, the watermelon came apart into uneven chunks that separated the flesh of the fruit from the rind. I-Pin had given her a score of 110, for tradition.

By the end of the night, watermelon and sushi had been eaten to satisfaction, the sand was shifted into piles from hitting the ground in volleyball, and the ashes of a driftwood fire were still red and warm.

* * *

When Tsuna had told his mother about the invitation to spend part of summer break at Shimon Island, even she had questioned how seven middle school students jointly owned a private island. Somewhere in the explanation, he had mentioned how they were working on renovating after it had been uninhabited for a long while. Nana Sawada immediately made it her business to help make the manor as homey as she was able.

For lack of proper measurements, she had brought a dozen yards of fabric and had packed a small sewing kit and a tape measure, and had set about making drapes to hang along empty windows.

She wasn't the only one either—Yamamoto's dad had sent him with a toolbox and a few cans of paint left over from when he had last repainted the outside of the sushi restaurant. Haru had brought some wood lacquer left over from a cosplay; the paintjob had given new life to the threshold. And when Adelheid learned that Kyoko knew how to operate a circular saw (even as a child her brother had been extreme enough that their parents did not trust him with power tools but had needed an extra pair of hands on a project), she had been pulled away to help replace a rotting internal wall.

With everyone else painting, cooking, sewing, sawing, or running rampant playing tag, that left Chrome, who had been told to take it easy after feeling ill earlier that morning; Haru, who had been told to take it easy after getting a horrific sunburn the first day; Fuuta, who was deemed to be too old to play tag by Lambo; and Julie, the archetypical spellcaster who was strong of mind and weak of limb and had dropped the end of a 2x4 on Enma's foot.

At Julie's suggestion, they had gone to an old storage room to see what could be found. Where the plans for the manor had indicated a room, there was a blank strip of wall. Julie grumbled something about his ancestors as he hit the wall with the flat of his hand.

Chrome ran a finger along the Mist Earring. "Mukurowl, Cambio Forma Version I."

A set of three lenses shifted into place in front of her eye, and she looked at the wall more closely. A few feet to the right of where Julie was checking, a crease in the wall lit up in the lens. She pushed the lens aside so it rested on her temple. She ran a hand along the line had had been highlighted. "Julie, can I borrow your pocket knife?"

"Now why would you assume that a good guy like me has a—" Julie flipped the knife out of his pocket and popped out the blade.

"Thank you." She put the tip of the blade against the line, and with only slight pressure the blade punched through the paint and into the gap.

"Ah, the door was painted over!" Haru exclaimed. "It's like something out of a mystery novel!"

Chrome ran the knife up and down the edge and along the top of the door, which was only aligned to her shoulders, and carefully pried open the panel. It popped off, freeing a hail of paint chips and dust.

Julie turned on his flashlight and ducked in first, coughing at the dust. "The floorboards are a little loose, but I think it's saaaaaAAAFE!" Wood cracked under his foot and that leg fell through the resulting hole. Chrome and Haru stepped into the crawl space, grabbed an arm each, and pulled Julie to his feet.

He was red in the face as he brushed off his pants. "Bah, time alone with the two cutest girls here and I look like an idiot, eh?" Chrome ignored him, and Haru only sighed and rolled her eyes.

Fuuta came into the crawl space, short enough that he didn't even have to duck. "Don't worry, my rankings put you as the fourth-coolest person I've seen!" Julie rolled his eyes and patted the top of Fuuta's head.

"Then I shudder to imagine who's above me," Julie said. "And you don't need to check! Although…" He started pulling aside tarps to check what was underneath, sending spiders skittering away. "Don't suppose you've got any rankings for spellcasters?"

"Like…illusionists? Sure I do," Fuuta said, pulling the overly-large book out from the inside of his jacket. "That's an uncommon ability, of all the people I've seen, only 78 of them have any illusory or psychic abilities."

"And don't suppose I could know where I rank in that list?" Julie said, trying to keep it cool even as a cloud of dust came up in his face. He turned his nose up at the bin full of mothballs and replaced the tarp.

Fuuta tilted his head. "I didn't even know you were a spellcaster. But that's even better, I can add you to the rankings and make it more accurate." Fuuta turned his head up toward the ceiling. Julie swore when gravity started to fail around the Ranking Prince, earning himself a smack in the hand from Haru.

"I can hear you ranking planet…" Fuuta said, in his trance. "Out of 79 people, Julie Katou is ranked as the 15th best spellcaster." He blinked, and the objects dropped to the ground.

"Hey, not bad! When it's such an uncommon ability, y'know?" Julie said. He shook his head. "You'd think with Enma around you'd get used to gravity disturbances…"

Fuuta already had a pencil out and was scribbling an update to the list. He pulled the book toward his chest when Julie tried to take a look.

"So where's Chrome on that list?"

Fuuta finished making the amendum. "Let's see…for, um, Chrome Dokuro, she is ranked as the third best illusionist in the mafia."

Julie nearly choked on his own tongue.

"Ooh, that's so wonderful Chrome! I had no idea you were so skilled!" Haru said. Chrome could only blush.

"And then, number one is…" Fuuta bit his lip, and skipped it. "Number 2 is Mammon, of the Varia. Number four after Chrome is the Ninth Mist Guardian, Bouche Croquant." He shifted the book in his hands.

"There might be somebody else to add to the top of that list, though," Chrome said quietly.

"Hm?"

"Nothing, nothing."

As Julie looked for any useful furniture, Haru went straight for a wooden crate marked 'KEEP DRY.' "Ooh, maybe wooden furniture? But it's a little too small…but I'm really curious. Is it okay if I pop the lid open, just a little peek? I'm so curious I can't stand it!" Julie lazily waved, and Haru took it as permission to work the lid off. Inside, packed in rags were several rectangular objects stored in stitched-closed cloth bags. "Ha-hi? Is that…that's a canvas!"

"Like a painting?" Chrome said, looking up from a faded journal.

"Exactly like a painting." Haru carefully pulled one out, the largest of the bunch, and set it on the floor. "Bet I can get it with my nails." She picked at the stitches and managed to pull a few apart, but only enough to see the top corner. "Oh, who did these stitches, can I see that knife?"

Julie grunted as he pushed a box. "Just a sec."

Chrome and Fuuta came over to Haru's side. Chrome carefully pulled aside the exposed corner. The little paint they could see suggested that it was thick oil paints. "Hey, here, isn't that a signature?" she said, pointing to faded graphite. She placed the magic lens back over her eye. "I think it says, 'duRoccia'?"

Haru's eyes widened, alight with eagerness. "duRoccia?! Oh, her work is wonderful! I did a project on her in elementary school, her energy is amazing, even in portraits there's this wonderful sense of life." She coughed, and blushed heavily. "She was an impressionist, but not too well known. She was born Italian, and moved to Japan in search of inspiration. Oh, I've only ever seen her work behind glass in a museum. Although, thinking about it, this painting would be, my, nearly a hundred years old! I had no idea that Enma's family went so far back. Chrome, is there a year marked?"

Chrome checked again, refocusing the lens. "Hm…oh, younger than one hundred. It's faint, but it says '68. So about forty years."

Haru pulled the painting back in front of her. "No way, duRoccia passed away during the 1930s! That would mean this was finished in 1868…but I had no idea she was painting that early. She couldn't have been any older than 18."

"Ooh, a mystery~" Julie said with a grin. He passed the pocket knife over to Haru and leaned back against a support pillar to watch.

Haru carefully cut apart the rest of the stiches, and held the canvas by the top and bottom as Fuuta pulled the bag away. "Oh, the colors," she said dreamily, and then all thought of that went out of her head when the subject of the portrait was exposed. "Oh my!"

Chrome gasped at the familiar faces. "Julie, look at this!"

Julie stopped playing with his hat and looked down at the painting, and he froze. "Holy shit," he said quietly, and was excused for the language choice. He put a hand over his mouth and closed his eyes. He took a deep breath, wiped at his eyes with his fingertips, and kneeled down to get a closer look. "How…I can't even, I gotta show this to everyone, they're gonna die!" he said, smiling big. "Oh, god, I can't believe it!"

Haru set the painting down _carefully_ , and stood up. "Hold on, I've got an idea! Fuuta, get that cloth over there, and we can use that chair. Chrome, Fuuta, can you tell everyone to meet in the foyer in an hour? But don't say what it's for, it's a surprise!" She picked up the cloth bag the canvas had been held in. "Julie, do you want to carry it downstairs?"

Julie reached out, then snapped his hand back. "Knowing how I screw things up, I'd trip and fall. You seem to know what you're doing with paintings."

"Alright, then, you can be the lookout so we can get it all downstairs without spoiling the surprise! Operation, ah," she hesitated, trying to think of a good name, then she looked over at Julie, still smiling. "Operation Smile is a go!"

* * *

 _And so…_

An hour later, everyone who was there on the island that day had been gathered into the entrance hall of Cozarto Manor, sitting on wooden benches, chairs, laps, and the floor. In front of the room, in front of the fireplace, Haru and Fuuta stood on either side of a chair with a cloth draped over it.

Half of the Shimon Family sat on a bench together; Enma in the middle, Shitopi and Adelheid on either side of him, Julie on Adelheid's other side, and Rauji sat on the floor next to Shitopi with Lambo standing on top of his shoulders. Kaoru Mizuno and Yamamoto stood in the back of the room, chatting about baseball, and Koyo and Ryohei seemed ready to get into an argument. Tsuna sat in one of the few chairs, Gokudera on the floor beside him, and I-Pin was on Tsuna's lap. Bianchi leaned against a wall with Reborn sitting on the top of the cabinet next to her. Nana Sawada and Kyoko were giving Chrome cooking advice, all three sitting on another bench. Chrome wasn't paying much attention.

Haru put on a big smiling face. "If I could have everybody's attention!" Everyone quieted down at her words, although a few seemed a bit impatient at having been taken away from their work. "An hour ago, myself, Chrome, Fuuta, and Julie explored a storage room, expecting furniture and finding a great treasure! I'm happy, and Julie is ecstatic to share with all of our friends from Shimon Middle School, a work by Anastasia duRoccia, 'La Famiglia Prima di Simon'!"

She pulled away the cloth to reveal a portrait depicting seven individuals sharing a resemblance to their descendants down to the keen red eyes—the first generation Shimon Family, Cozart Simon and his Guardians, in warm, earthy colors.

The shock was palpable.

Adelheid had one hand to her mouth and the other gripping tightly to the bench. Julie put an arm around her shoulders. She took his hand in her own. "Oh god, I don't…" Her shoulders were shaking. She covered her eyes for the sake of her pride, and leaned into Julie.

Lambo poked at Rauji. "Oi, oi, why are you turning red?"

Enma placed a hand on Shitopi's shoulder for a moment, and she nodded, only smiling. Enma stood to approach the painting. "I can't believe something like this was under our noses all along." He focused his gaze on Cozart Simon in the center. "Just…amazing." He clenched his fist. He didn't turn around as he started to talk. "This island, it was once home to all of our ancestors. My great-some grandfather, Cozart Simon. Once, there were a lot of people here, but the number's dwindled, and now it's just the seven of us, trying to survive in a big cruel world." He took a deep breath. "A few weeks ago, Julie told me about a dream he had, where he was walking through the jungle, and saw tiny footprints in the sand, and heard laughter through the trees. I wanted to help make that dream real. Maybe it's selfish, but…thank you, everyone, for coming here and bringing life here again."

"Hear, hear," Kaoru said with a smile from the back of the room.

"Happy to be here," said Kyoko.

Koyo stepped forward from the wall, and stretched out his arms. "Now then," he said, but smiling as he continued. "Now that we've all listened to Enma blubber, who wants food? I aim to end the night with a tie wrapped around my head like a headband!"

"Koyo, what have I told you about alcohol? How did you even get any past Adel?"

"How about some baseball out on the beach? Me and Kaoru versus everyone else!"

"That's not fair, you'll thrash us anyways!"

"Don't worry, Tenth, I've got a plan for victory!"

"Hiie! Gokudera, not anything that involves sabotage! And that includes putting poison cooking into their drinks! And hold on, Bianchi, stay away from the kitchen!"

* * *

 _Summer Vacation with Shimon-END_

 _Next time: what's the Big Deal with Boxing? It's time for Sunny Kyoko!_


	4. Sunny Kyoko

_A/N: Thanks to everyone who followed! I will be doing my best to make it worth your time spent reading!_

 **Sunny Kyoko**

It was only a scrimmage for members of the same high school boxing club, but judging by the energy put into it by Ryohei Sasagawa it could be mistaken for the Ring Battle back in the day.

"Alright everyone, circle up!" Yamamoto said, pulling Gokudera along.

Ryohei pounded his gloved fists together. "To the extreme! Sawada, Dokuro, you too! Where the hell is Hibari?"

 _Probably reinforcing his rule over Namimori High School,_ Tsuna thought. Chrome was bright red in the face as she stepped up beside him. "You don't have to do this if you don't want to," he muttered. She nodded, and quickly backed up to her seat. He shook his head in wonder, then put an arm around each Yamamoto and Ryohei's shoulders.

In unison they shouted out, " _RYOHEI! FIGHT-O!"_

Ryohei knocked his fists together again and yelled out a battle cry as he turned to the practice ring—to the horror of the referee, a first year student who selected the club to avoid the Go-Home Club, and to the interest of his opponent, a senior with thirty pounds, three inches, and three years of experience on Ryohei, and the vice-captain of the Namimori High Boxing Club.

Ayate Mashita really had no idea how little of a chance he stood.

Ryohei pulled on his headgear, put a mouth guard between his teeth, and stepped between the ropes. Mashita had his arms raised only halfway into a guard position.

The first round started, and Ryohei easily landed the first punch right on Mashita's chin. Kyoko, watching from the side, winced. "Oh, I still don't know how he can do this," she said.

"He's probably been hit in the head too many times to register that it's a bad thing," Hana said, using her hand as a pedestal for her chin.

"Thanks again for agreeing to come, Hana, I know you don't much like boxing."

"It's not the boxing I don't like. It's the contest of childish masculinity that I can't stand."

Koyo was standing up on the bench shouting threats if his rival would lose "in the end!" Given how unsteady Mashita was on his feet, it didn't seem likely.

"Like I said, 'in the end'," Hana said sarcastically.

"Oh, I think it's fun, 'to the extreme'," Kyoko said with a smile. "Or at least the energy is nice to be around."

Just before the first round ended, Ryohei landed a punch square on Mashita's nose. The upperclassman stumbled back, and the bell rang to signal the end of the first three minutes.

Mashita pulled his glove off to stifle the nosebleed, and grabbed a towel from one of his fellow seniors and chucked it over his shoulder. "Gah, Sasagawa, dat's some straight you got! I can't go another round, I shudder to imagine what you're like when you're serious."

Kyoko thought of steel breaking apart at an impact from a fist protected only by thin wraps, then of a shine of sun flames bursting through the air at the target—and she didn't even know how much his power had grown since then. _My brother could kill a normal human with that power._ The thought made her shiver.

"Oi, you can't throw in the towel! We were just getting started you asshole!" Three upperclassmen had to jump into the ring to keep Ryohei from going after Mashita anyways.

It was Koyo's turn next, and he started pulling his gear on as Ryohei reluctantly went to the locker room to cool off.

"That ended quickly," Kyoko said to nobody in particular. "I know it's a scrimmage, but my brother was really looking forward to this." _I still don't really get it, though…_

* * *

 _Later..._

Kyoko met up with Ryohei out at the front gate of Namimori High School, shifting back and forth on her feet in her anxiousness. Ryohei had his gloves tied together by the laces and looped over his neck, and was smiling despite the disappointment of not getting a full match. He didn't so much as walk as he hopped, pulling off the weights that he had strapped to his ankles and over his shoulders. In theory, it was to increase the resistance on his body during his workouts, but in practice it also served as a sort of limiter to keep him from using his full strength.

"Ey, lil' sis, what'd you think?" he said, throwing the weights into his bag.

"It was pretty neat," she said. "Did you enjoy it?"

He wrinkled his nose. "Stupid Mashita, he could have taken a punch twice what I gave! Without trying what's even the point?!"

"But what if he couldn't have? You could have hurt him," Kyoko said in protest.

Ryohei shook his head. "I could see it. Mashita's strong of body but weak of will! What's even the point of anything if you don't push your limits?"

Kyoko frowned. "Mm."

Ryohei put a hand on her shoulder. "Oi, is something wrong? Are you sick?"

"I'm not sick, just…thinking." She pursed her lips. "Why do you do boxing so much?"

"That's all? You know why, so I can protect everyone with the force of my fist!" He clenched his left hand into a fist to emphasize his point.

"But you've been a boxer a lot longer than you've been fighting for that reason," she said. "Why ever? Why go to a boxing club with people who aren't as strong as you, why practice so much for just…a sport?"

Ryohei opened his mouth, then seemed to choke on his own tongue. "Because…because…" He put a hand on the bangle looped around his bicep. "Because when you're facing somebody in that ring—when you cross fists with a person, that's when their true nature comes out. When you can see what kind of person they are, to the extreme! It's not just about being strong physically, but about having the will to become stronger, for everything that matters, you get it?"

"I…I guess so." She rubbed the back of her head. "Come on, I'll make noodles for dinner tonight."

* * *

The next day, when Ryohei Sasagawa showed up at the practice room for the Namimori High School Boxing Club, there was already somebody there waiting for him.

"Kyoko, what are you doing?"

She was wearing athletic clothes, running shoes, and had on her brother's oldest pair of boxing gloves, a kiddy pair decorated with stars that had almost no padding and were still too big for her hands. "Show me why boxing is so important to you!"

He started choking on his own tongue again. "No! Absolutely not, you're my little sister and boxing is dangerous!"

"I'm not asking you to fight me, I'm asking you to show me why boxing is so important to you!"

"Girls don't box!"

"A-ha! That's where you're wrong!" She pulled off one of the gloves—which she had no hand wraps beneath and were not laced up at all—and grabbed an index card sticking out of her bag. "This past Olympics they had three weight classes for women! And Ren Cancan won silver for flyweight, and Li Jinzi got bronze for middleweight, both from China. And Li Jinzi started when she was fourteen!" She put the index card back down. "You're my brother, I should know you better than anyone, but I still don't understand boxing or why it's so important to you! I'm not going to start competing, I just want to understand why you care about it, to the extreme."

Ryohei's hands were shaking. He ground his teeth together. "Gaaagh! It was that kid, wasn't it?"

Kyoko's mouth drew into a thin line. "I have no idea who you're talking about." She knew _exactly_ who he was talking about, and he was 100% correct.

* * *

 _The Previous Day..._

Several hours after the scrimmage, Kyoko walked the sidewalks of Namimori, her brother's words rolling through her head, still trying to understand the idea of it. The streetlamps weren't quite on yet, but it was starting to get late.

Without quite realizing it, she found herself outside the Sawada house. _I should probably head back, he'll be getting worried._ She folded her hand into a fist, and brought it up near her face. _Crossing fists with the other person._ She punched lightly into the air. _I don't get it._

She turned back around to head home, but stopped when she heard a cry from one of the 2nd floor windows of the Sawada home. "Lambo, put those down! HIIIIEEE, WHERE'S THE PINS?" The window came open, and three bright-purple toy grenades came flying out over the street. It was only then that Tsuna stuck his head out and saw Kyoko, right in position where the grenades would land, and he shrieked.

Kyoko dropped to the ground, covering the back of her head with her arms and braced herself.

"Ka-o-su Shot!" And a gun went off, three shots bursting straight out from one bullet and piercing each of the grenades just as they went off and angling out around Kyoko. She waited about five seconds before daring to look up. Reborn had just dropped onto the wall surrounding the house, his gun still in hand.

"Kyoko, I'm so sorry!" Tsuna shouted, leaning out his window. He leaned out a little more and came tumbling out with a yell.

"Oh, no, it's okay! Uh…" She looked to Reborn. "Um, thank you for saving me," she said, bowing respectfully.

Reborn was too busy watching his student attempt to gain his footing, even as Lambo followed Tsuna out the window and landed on his head. "I needed some target practice anyways, but you're welcome." His pistol turned back into the shape-memory chameleon Leon sitting on the brim of his hat.

Tsuna finally pulled himself up to the wall. "Kyoko, are you okay? I'm so sorry, I thought I got rid of all of Lambo's grenades but he must have hid those away somewhere."

She shook her head. "No, no, it's fine. Besides, they're just smoke grenades, right?" She picked up one of the casings from the ground. At a touch, the casing fell apart into two halves along the machined seam. The charge had been mostly annihilated by the bullet, but there was still some of the goopy fuel on the inside of the casing.

He ignored her, in favor of grabbing Lambo before he could run off and propping him up on top of the wall. "Apologize to Kyoko, now!"

He stuck out his tongue and pulled down the lower lid on one of his eyes. "Biiii~"

"Lambo, stop that!"

"The Great Lambo bows to no-one and apologizes to no-one!"

"I'd better get back home," Kyoko said with a sigh.

Tsuna gave only a half-hearted attempt to grab Lambo before he ran off. "No, it's fine. Did you need something?"

She shook her head. "No, no, it was just a coincidence that I wound up around here, I was just out for a walk and wandering."

"You need somebody to talk to? It's the least I can do, after how much you've helped me," he said. He went down to the gate and came back down to where Kyoko was leaning against the wall.

She smiled. _You've paid it back so many times, in smiles and in protecting all of us_ , she thought, but said, "It's just…my brother."

She explained her attempt to get him to explain his love for boxing, and her frustration at being unable to understand what he was saying.

Tsuna crossed his arms over his chest. "I kind of get what he means, although I've never really fought for reasons like that. It's like…"

"You're as likely to get a clearly-worded answer out of Tsuna as you are your brother," Reborn said. He had stuck around standing on top of the fence the entire time. "But you're also like your brother, Kyoko. He doesn't speak in words, he speaks with his actions."

"So, what should I do?"

"Like I said, he speaks with his actions. If he won't tell you why boxing is important to him, get him to show you."

"Wait, Reborn, I don't know if that's really a good idea," Tsuna said, putting a hand to the back of his head. "Ryohei is a little…protective of Kyoko. No offense."

"None taken," she said, shaking her head. "It's true, after all. The closest he wants me, or any other girl, to a boxing ring is sitting on the bench cheering him on."

"Then prove that you deserve to be treated the same as he would anyone else who is in the ring." Reborn shrugged. "He isn't that complicated."

She crossed her arms over her chest. "I'll think about it. Thanks, Tsuna, Reborn. If I don't see you before then, see you at school."

As she walked away, Tsuna looked over at Reborn. "I'm kinda surprised you didn't shoot me with the Dying Will Bullet to save her. And you never need target practice."

"You wouldn't have been fast enough," Reborn said with an air of finality.

"I would have been plenty fast enough!"

"Nope."

"…no, I wouldn't have."

* * *

 _Now..._

Grumbling all the way, Ryohei grabbed the kiddie boxing gloves away from Kyoko and picked up his own hand wraps and a spare pair. He tossed the spares to Kyoko, and sat down on the bench. "Like this."

He unrolled the first few inches of the first hand wrap, put the loop around his left thumb, and wrapped around his wrist twice. He waited for Kyoko to do the same thing. She sat down next to him, started unrolling the hand wrap, and it fell out of her hands and unrolled across the floor. She went red in the face. "Pick it up, and put the loop around your thumb." She grabbed the end of the hand wrap, and mimicked him. He went up and around the top of his palms and the first knuckle, wrapping there twice. "Your hand is smaller than mine. When I go around twice, you go around three times." She wrapped her knuckles around three times. He continued, wrapping twice in an x- shape across the back of his hand, then once around his thumb. From there, he pulled it through the gaps between his fingers, once for each gap, one more time around his knuckles, and back around to his wrist enough times to finish it off, then fixed it in place with Velcro. He looked to Kyoko, whose mouth was drawn into a line as she looked from her work to her brother's. His was snug and would keep his knuckles protected and bones in place as he threw a punch; her hand wrap was loose and already falling apart. "Pull it tight, but not tight enough to cut off blood flow."

He took her hand and redid the wrappings for her, and guided her through the process on her right hand.

Ryohei grabbed a practice mat off the stack like the kind grade-school kids learned to do somersaults on. There was a cold intensity in his eyes Kyoko had never seen before.

"First I'll show you how to guard, then how to move your feet, then how to condition yourself." He raised his fists to a guard position on either side of his head. "Kyoko—if there's anyone who can do it, it's my little sister. When you can withstand one of my punches, you'll understand why I love boxing to the extreme!"

* * *

By no means was Kyoko Sasagawa out of shape. She had always done club volleyball at school for exercise and for fun. But at the end of three days, she came home barely dragging herself in, soaking with sweat and red in the face from exertion. Her arms felt like they were made of lead, and it hurt even to swallow water.

Hana was waiting outside her house, tapping her foot impatiently. "There you are, I've been calling all day! What is that meathead doing to you?"

Kyoko shook her head. "No, it's not…I just want…"

"Kyoko, this is absurd that you're letting him push you into this machismo game of his, you need to stand up for yourself!"

"I'm not getting pushed into anything, I'm just trying to be better," she said, just starting to get her breath back.

"Oh, where is he, still out running?"

Kyoko pointed to the door. "He hasn't gone out yet. I went out running on my own so we could do the summer assignment tonight."

Hana peered at her friend with narrowed eyes. "You…"

"As much as he didn't like the idea of it, and he's having me go really slow at first, I think he really likes having somebody to train with, and I like spending time with him," Kyoko said. "And as far as I can tell, I must be the only person who can keep up with him, judging by what even those high school kids say about him."

Hana groaned. "Ugh, you and your brother are the same kind of person. Come on, my dad showed me how to make a protein drink taste okay, we can get to work on that assignment."

* * *

The night before they went back to school, Kyoko pulled a padded glove onto her hand, stood in position, and took a punch from Ryohei that he labeled as the "Silenced Maximum Cannon", one-tenth the maximum power that he could muster. It destroyed the target glove, left her arm numb, and made the benches behind her rattle from the vibrations in the air, but she was still ready and aware, which was more than Ayate Mashita could say after receiving the same punch a week earlier.

* * *

 _A/N: We'll get back to Kyoko in a bit, once she's trained up a bit more. In the meantime, shenanigans. Next time, The Number One Best Toilet Cleaner! All About Lambo!_


	5. Lambo's Haircut

**Target 5: Lambo's Haircut**

"Pay attention. What's the answer to problem three?"

"How am I supposed to pay attention with that screaming out there?"

"Incorrect." Reborn pressed the button on the remote, and an electric shock running through Tsuna's body made his hair stand out.

"Stupidera!" shouted Lambo from outside the door, followed by a long raspberry.

"Stupid cow, the Tenth is trying to study!"

There was a yell and a thump as both Gokudera and Lambo fell over a tripwire that had been placed in the hallway.

"What's the answer to problem four?" Reborn asked, as Gokudera yelled out triumphantly.

"Uh….oh, uh, three radical two?" Tsuna braced himself to be shocked again.

"Correct." Reborn pressed the button anyways. "For hesitating."

"At this rate I'm going to get electric skin like Lambo," Tsuna grunted.

Gokudera made a noise of disgust immediately outside the door. "Oi, did something die and start rotting in your hair?! This is disgusting! I'm tired of it!"

Lambo was crying and yelling trying to get away from Gokudera. The sound was just barely decreasing in volume as they moved away from the door.

Tsuna groaned and stood up from his seat. "I don't care about the punishment, I need to make sure Gokudera doesn't kill Lambo!" He dashed out the door after them, ran down the stairs, and got into the bathroom just as Gokudera cut away a chunk of hair the size of his fist matted with syrupy melted sugar. A handful of wrapped candies fell out with it.

Lambo screamed bloody murder through his tears. "Stupid-stupid-stupid-deraaaa! Die die die!"

Gokudera took off another piece of hair from the back that loosed a travel-sized western chess set. Lambo yelled out even louder, kicking and swinging his arms, and his horns started sparking with electricity. Tsuna didn't even have time to warn Gokudera, he could only duck and cover before an electric charge blasted Gokudera back into the opposite wall. He dropped into the tub, his hair standing on end. The scissors he had been attacking Lambo's hair with were still red-hot from the conducted charge.

Lambo dropped to the ground, toys still falling out his hair as he ran away as fast as his little legs could carry him. He ran behind Tsuna and tried to make himself as small as he could. Tsuna grabbed him up in his arms even as Gokudera pulled himself through the doorway with his eyes screaming murder.

"Gokudera, that's enough!" Tsuna said sharply, as Lambo cried into his shirt. "Look at yourself! You're a big bad adult hitman who made a six year old cry, are you proud of that?"

Gokudera snapped back as though struck. "T-Tenth," he said. He looked at Lambo, still crying with his arms over his head as though to protect himself. Gokudera went green in the face. "Agh…I…he was…"

Tsuna softened his tone. "He was being a six year old."

Gokudera started to reach forward, but quickly snatched his hand back. His shoulders sunk and his eyes were fixed on the ground at Tsuna's feet. "I…I'll clean this up."

Tsuna nodded and walked away. "Lambo, you want some juice?"

Lambo sniffled loudly, snot still dripping from his nose. "Grape."

Tsuna stepped into the kitchen, grabbed the grape juice out of the fridge, and poured a glass all one-handed as he looked over Lambo. _I can't help but agree with Gokudera, it's unhygienic how much hair he has and how unclean it is. And now it's lopsided at that. Nearly cut to his scalp on the back, and the left side is shorter than the right._ He set Lambo down in his seat and placed the cup in front of him. His face was splotchy.

"Lambo? Are you okay?"

"Mm gonna kill Stupidera…"

Tsuna sighed. _One problem at a time._ "What he did was wrong, I'm right there with you."

Lambo wasn't the type to say 'thank you'. But he did stay quiet, which Tsuna took as being as close to gratitude as the boy could muster.

"I'm sorry to say this, Lambo," Tsuna said, pushing right along to the uncomfortable part. "But I think it might be a good idea to go by a hairdresser, get your hair evened out." Lambo eyed him uncomfortable over the lip of his cup. "If you don't want to, you don't have to. I won't make you do anything you don't want to, that's a promise. But if you did, it'd make it grow back in much better. It would be done by a lady, probably, who would cut only as much as you asked for and no more than that, and you'd get a lollipop when you were done." Tsuna had no idea if that was true anymore, he was just remembering the haircuts he had gotten when he was a kid. "You know, I used to be afraid of haircuts. Not for any normal reason; because I didn't like the feeling of the loose hairs in my shirt, and thought it was bugs."

"Stupid No-Good Tsuna," Lambo said, but he was smiling.

Tsuna smiled in relief. "So, you can drink your juice, and go collect your toys, and think about whether you'd like to go to a hairdresser, alright?" And as Lambo continued sipping at his grape juice thoughtfully, getting it all down his front, Tsuna took the opportunity to grab into a piece of metal sticking out of what remained of Lambo's hair and pull the Ten Year Bazooka out by the grip. Lambo didn't seem to notice. _And let's not have this thing be an issue anymore._

The Ten Year Bazooka took a place on the top shelf of Tsuna's closet, right next to Lambo's grenades on one side, and the Helmet of Lightning version X on the other.

* * *

The hairdresser was a kind-looking woman who took the massive number of toys stuffed in Lambo's hair in stride. At the chop job, Tsuna explained it as Lambo's older brother had tried to cut out a piece of hair matted with gum and went way too far. The hairdresser was patient at Lambo's shaking in the chair, although Tsuna did notice that she seemed to take an inordinate amount of satisfaction at being able to go at the mess. By the time she was done, Lambo's head was half the size it had been, and what had been a horrible matted afro was cut down to wavy curls that still stuck out in every direction, but also had absolutely no room for any of his toys to be tucked into it.

"Who're you, you're Lambo, who am I, I'm Lambo!" He was slurping away at a lime-flavored sucker.

"Just call me your cute older brother," Tsuna muttered. Because naturally he had gotten stuck with taking Lambo for his haircut. "Hold my hand while we cross the street."

Nana Sawada was teaching I-Pin how to mend clothes, although Tsuna suspected that the third most promising young assassin would be more likely to use the sewing needle as a weapon. Gokudera had been spending his time staying away from Lambo, as the boy was still terrified of him after the events of the previous day.

Lambo absently took his hand and didn't try to pull away when they were across the street. He pulled out the sucker, already most of the way down, and stared at the green surface.

"What's on your mind?" Tsuna said, catching the nearly thoughtful look on the little boy's face.

"Looks like lightning," Lambo said. It took a moment for Tsuna to catch the connection between the green of his sucker and the green of lightning flames.

"I guess it kind of does." _Although I've only rarely seen lightning flames that weren't in the process of electrocuting me…_

He stuck the sucker back in his mouth, and said between slurps "Lambo misses Gyuudon."

Tsuna rubbed the back of his neck, and glanced at the ring that he always wore any more. He took any opportunity he could to bring out Nuts—he had even summoned him once on a particularly cold night earlier in the spring, when the heat he radiated even made Reborn admit that it was worth the amount that Nuts' mane lit up the room. Uri was always walking all over Gokudera's schoolwork, and he had seen Yamamoto practicing his pitches with Kojirou sitting on his shoulder while Jirou retrieved balls. Hibari often had the little hedgehog Roll sitting on his shoulder opposite to Hibird, Ryohei regularly sparred with Garyuu, and more than once Tsuna had seen the white-feathered Mukurowl flying over Namimori at dusk. _And then there's Lambo. He likes being around his Box Animal as much as any of the rest of us. But the last time he tried to ignite the helmet, it didn't work, all he succeeded in doing was electrocuting himself._ He frowned.

"Lambo," Tsuna said. "How about this: let me talk to you, ask you a couple questions. Then, when we get home, I'll teach you how to summon Gyuudon from your Vongola Gear."

"Mmm," Lambo said, pursing his lips and looking at Tsuna through the corner of his eye. "Teach. Then Lambo might talk to you."

"Come on, Lambo, you know I wouldn't go back on my word." He ran his thumb over the base of the ring as he formulated his sentences. "Alright? We have a deal? Good. So." He sighed. "Lambo…you like playing games, right?"

"Mm-hm," Lambo said, sulking at Tsuna seeing right through him.

"You like playing with I-Pin, right? And Fuuta, and Bianchi, and Maman," he said, using the cutesy name all of the freeloaders used.

"Mm-hm!" Lambo said, more happily.

"So you like playing games with the people you like, and sharing your time with them, you like being around them, yeah?"

"Uh-huh!"

"So, next question. Little boys, they play games and eat treats and spend time with the people they love. But usually, little boys don't fight, not for real fighting. They don't learn to throw grenades, or to use box weapons, or come along for dangerous situations. Why do you?"

Lambo thought about it for a moment. "Lambo's strong and tough! You prove it by fighting!"

"But, why do you want to be strong? Just for the sake of strength?"

"Uh…"

"Sorry, too abstract. Do you want to be strong so you can hurt other people?"

Lambo looked up at Tsuna with wide eyes. "Nuh-uh."

"I didn't think so. Do you want to be strong for your own confidence? So you can think better of yourself?"

"Stupid Tsuna, Lambo is the best in the world already!"

"Heh. Of course you are. So, do you want to be strong, to be respected by others?"

"Lambo doesn't care what other people think. Lambo is the best~"

 _Sometimes I wish I were like him. I just wish I could do things without stressing out about how other people look at me._ "So, why do you want to be strong, if it's not to hurt people, or to feel better about yourself, or to be respected?" _Come on, Lambo, I know the answer. I know how you were able to use the Cambio Forma ver I ten years in the future. You're so close, I can feel it._

Lambo rocked his head back and forth and side to side. "To play games."

 _Bingo!_ "You want to be strong, so you can play games?"

"Play tag with I-Pin, and Rauji. I wanna be strong so I can eat maman's cooking when she's not looking. Wanna be strong so I can come with No Good Tsuna and Baseball Takeshi and Loud Ryohei and Quiet Dokuro and Stupidera."

"To protect them, so that you can have the happy days."

Lambo nodded furiously.

"I wish I could be as resolved as you are, Lambo. Come on, let's go inside."

Lambo had kept on walking, so involved was he in the conversation that he hadn't noticed when they had come to the house. He dashed inside the house, and Tsuna just caught his mother cooing at Lambo's haircut. By the time he got in, Lambo was already up the stairs dangling from the handle on Tsuna's bedroom door.

Tsuna pushed it open with Lambo still swinging from the handle, nodded at Reborn, who was reading an Italian newspaper, and said "Might want to get to safety. I promised Lambo I'd teach him how to summon Gyuudon."

Reborn raised an eyebrow, perhaps surprised that the soon to be near-death experience wasn't caused by him. "I live for danger," was what he said, but Leon seemed far less confident, hiding on the inside of Reborn's fedora.

"If you say so." Tsuna had to stand up on his tiptoes to reach the Lightning Helm he had stored up in the top of his closet, and grabbed it by one of the horns. _It's like a motorcycle helmet. Urgh, I don't need to think about any version of Lambo riding a motorcycle._ He pulled the closet closed. Lambo had abandoned the door in favor of dangling from his pant leg. "Can you let go of my leg, please?"

"Don-don-don, Gyuuuudon," Lambo sang without a tune, but did let go.

"Alright. Actually, now that I think about it, the helm might actually fit over your head since there's not all that junk in it anymore." He knelt down and with both hands carefully fitted it over Lambo's head. It fit him perfectly, although it did look a little out of proportion on his tiny body. "Ha. Oh, I'm sorry, I didn't mean to laugh at you. That fit okay?"

"Feels funny," Lambo said, his voice still perfectly clear in spite of the helmet covering his mouth.

"I'm sure it does. So, remember what I talked to you about? You said that you wanted to be strong to be able to protect them on the bad days, so you can have the good days together. I want you to think of that feeling of resolution to help the people you care about. Let it fill you up, and then, imagine those sparks you can make spiraling out from the surface of the helmet. Ignite the gear with your lightning flames, and then call out Gyuudon's name."

Lambo looked at Tsuna like he didn't quite believe the older boy. "Mmm…." He screwed his face in focus, and he looked so intent that Tsuna started to worry he would pop a blood vessel from the strain.

"Lambo, if you can't get it you can try again later."

Reborn laughed. "Don't bother with it. It's evident that Lambo can't hope to keep up with his boss."

Lambo whipped around to glare at Reborn. "Stupid stupid Reborn! I'll show you! Thunder Set!" Dense Lightning Flames ignited on the helm's emblem and spread across the surface. "Gyuudon!"

Tsuna shaded his eyes with his hand as Reborn pulled out a pair of sunglasses and a mass of lightning flames spread out from Lambo.

Lambo got thrown up into the air and landed on the rapidly solidifying figure's head. The flames faded until there was only a faint green aura, and sparks wreathing its horns. The black-armored bull snorted, and Lambo threw his arms around Gyuudon's neck and laughed. "Don-don-don, Gyuuuudon and I'm Laaaambo!" He patted his box animal on the nose, and Gyuudon lowed in affection. Lambo looked up at Reborn, stuck out his tongue, and pulled down his lower eyelid. "Biiiii~" Reborn wasn't impressed.

Gyuudon stomped out the room with Lambo cheering on his back, and Tsuna sighed. "Glad that worked, anyways," he said. "Thanks, by the way. I know it must have been a blow to your pride to help Lambo."

"If I said anything that 'helped', him, it was entirely accidental," Reborn said flatly, although even he couldn't hide the look of satisfaction in his eye.

"Uh-huh," Tsuna said, rolling his eyes. "You sure don't know exactly how Lambo responds to insults, by becoming more resolute and insisting upon proving you wrong. What do I know?" He practically couldn't stand under the weight of his own sarcasm.

* * *

Somehow he was able to manage it. By the end of the night, he was walking aimlessly around the house. His homework was done, and Reborn was busy composing a letter to the Ninth. Too late to do anything, but far too early to go to bed.

He went downstairs for a glass of water, and found his mother sitting at the table looking over the contents of a file folder. She sighed, looked up, and smiled.

"Hey." He nodded and went to the kitchen. "What's with all the papers?"

"Oh, just…a thought…" She turned one over and sighed. "Tsu, didn't I see a Japanese-Italian dictionary in your room?"

Tsuna was momentarily stunned at the question. "Um…yeah, I don't know where it went thought. Gimme one second. What are you looking over that's in Italian?"

"Something your father sent," she said. "My, I might have been good in English language when I was in school, but a few cognates just doesn't help much. And the grammar is different enough that even a dictionary might not help, but I hate the idea of bothering Bianchi."

Tsuna sipped at his water and glanced at the paper. "Um…that says 'Birthday', I think. Which is… _Ventotto di Maggio,_ I think…Eighth, no, Twenty-Eighth of May. Wait…hold on, isn't that Lambo's birthday?"

She turned pink. "Yes, ah. Oh, why am I playing all secretive? Well, you know how Lambo came to live with us because your father found him and thought he would find a good home here?"

 _That's one hell of a lie!_ "Yep. Just like that. Lightning kid comes to live with a teenage boy and his mother? Just call me Kiyomaro."

She missed the reference, and just nodded. "Well, apparently, Lambo's parents are…not in the picture? I'm sorry, I'm only being vague because the records are a bit, well, vague. But he's a legal ward to an organization, instead of his parents. It would appear that his birth certificate was printed nearly a year after he was born." She shook her head. "It's just maddening. At any rate, I would be more than happy to continue having him stay here, he's so sweet and loves staying with us. But it's very difficult. As much as I care for him, I'm not able to enroll him in school, or make medical decisions, and he can't be covered under papa's health insurance." She sighed. "So…because of everything, your father suggested that we adopt Lambo."

Tsuna said nothing. Water dribbled down his chin as his brain rebooted.

"Tsu? What do you think?"

He wiped off his mouth. "Uh! Ah! I think…I mean…" _I wouldn't be able to call him a freeloader any more. But…okay…_ "Sorry, you just took me by surprise. I think that it's not my business I guess? I mean, he loves you a lot, like maybe even more than you realize. If you want to adopt him, and he wants to be adopted by you, then I say go for it. It'll be fun to try and explain why my little brother is ten years my junior, and Italian at that." He laughed at the thought of it. "But everyone already thinks that Lambo is my little brother. And from what I know of what his, uh, 'family' was like in Italy, he's a lot better off here. And like you said, it's easier with school, and medical care. So…what's with the weird smile?"

She was smiling, rocking to the sides in her seat, her hands laced together. "Oh, nothing, nothing, Tsu. I'll need to send an adoption application to the Italian embassy…I suppose it might actually look better if it's in Italian, though, so I may have to ask Bianchi for help after all."

"Ask Reborn, he writes formal letters in Italian all the time."

"Oh? Does he have a little pen pal? Well, I'll be sure to ask him. Thank you so much, Tsu." She happily hummed a song from the radio as she flipped through the papers.

* * *

 _A/N: Fuuta is legally an emancipated minor. Technically it would probably be impossible irl for a kid as young as Fuuta to become emancipated, but mafia shenanigans are involved and money talks, plus he's got the money made from selling his rankings to fall back on. He's signed paperwork saying that Tsuna can make medical decisions if Fuuta is unable to. As for I-Pin, I'm thinking that Fon is her legal guardian, but Nana Sawada has been indicated as a health care proxy since I-Pin started staying with them, although it hasn't been necessary._

 _Next time: How things have changed? Rainbow Curiosities Mini-Arc Begins!_


	6. Rainbow Curiosities

**Target 6: Rainbow Curiosities**

The only thing worse than waking up an hour before his alarm and being unable to fall back asleep, was when Tsuna stopped in his tracks halfway to the school upon realizing that it was Saturday and there was no class.

As Tsuna dropped to his knees and yelled out, Reborn was watching with amusement. "I was wondering what you were doing. I thought you might have been sleep walking."

Tsuna looked up at Reborn, who was standing on top of the wall that ran next to the sidewalk, and squinted. "As far as I know, you're the only one that sleeps with his eyes open."

"Are you sure?"

A year earlier, Tsuna would have laughed at the idea. Two years earlier he wouldn't have understood what his tutor was implying.

As it was, all he could do was groan and say "No, no, no, that is—there's no way you're not screwing with me." Reborn replied with a smirk that Tsuna had grown to fear. "Oh, you've gotta be kidding me! Sleeping with my eyes open?!" _Although that would explain why my eyes have felt so dry lately…_

"Only when you're sleeping lightly," Reborn said. "It requires practice before you can do it the whole night through, but it's an excellent skill to have for warding off assassins."

"Yeah and it's also a great skill for weirding people out! And just freaking people out, now that I think about it, that's why Gokudera started shaking me in the middle of class and saying that it was like I'd gone deaf!"

"You fell asleep in class?"

"…No. Okay I'm not going home immediately to get laughed at, do you want an espresso from that shop downtown or not?" Reborn peered at him from under the brim of his hat, and Tsuna couldn't help himself from smiling in victory as Reborn hopped onto his shoulder for a ride. _Man, I really need to thank Lal for that tip about the espresso._

* * *

While the Café Court was little more than an internet café, it still managed to have some of the better coffee in Namimori—and the fact that the baristas were cute university girls helped its popularity. Between the café's popularity and that it was in such a high foot traffic area, it shouldn't have been surprising for Tsuna to cross paths with his friends, but that didn't keep him from sighing whenever another one walked in the door.

First it had been Gokudera, Haru, and Chrome, the latter two having gone out for Haru Appreciation Day and Haru had dragged Gokudera along. Yamamoto had come to the café with the baseball team after an early morning practice, and hung around after they had all gone home. Ryohei had been out on a morning run with Kyoko, who was still a little out of it after blocking her brother's 20% Maximum Cannon the previous day—the force of which was on a level with each individual punch in a Maximum Combination. Everyone was crowded around a small table, chatting with one another, while Tsuna was trying to develop a taste for coffee and failing horribly.

"Too bitter," he muttered, setting the cup down. Across from him, Reborn was reading the financial section of the daily paper. Tsuna squinted at a name written phonetically in katakana. "Caruoso Regieree?"

"Carlos Legiérre," Reborn said, without looking up.

"Oh. Carlos Legiérre," Tsuna said, plowing right ahead, "of Carcassa Freight, found guilty of a hundred and thirty-two counts of drug trafficking…Carcassa, Carcassa, why does that sound familiar?"

Gokudera furrowed his brow. "I know that company, I think. Based out of Italy, pretty big name…"

Reborn lowered his newspaper and glanced at Chrome. Without a word, she set a hand on her earring and anyone listening to them would only hear conversations appropriate to Japanese middle schoolers. Tsuna saw her casting an illusion, then looked at Reborn, and it hit him like a brick. "Wait, isn't that the company that Skull works for?"

"He worked for the family, yes," Reborn said. "Although apparently he was fired several months ago."

"Oh, that's um…a little weird," Tsuna said, frowning. _Right, Carcassa was the family that wasn't allowed into Mafia Land because they dealt drugs. Skull worked for them at a tactician, in some form. So it has a shipping company as a front for their drug deals? I guess that's how they get away with having such a strong naval presence. Guess the law finally caught up with them, though._

"Not really. Carcassa's CEO, Carlos Legiérre, has a history of being detached from the operations."

Yamamoto looked thoughtful. "So, like, he didn't think it was important?"

"Along those lines. The Vongola's strength derives from the different people with their own specialized skillsets that are brought into the family. Legiérre followed the assumption that the most important thing was to have good businessmen. But when it comes to warfare, Skull was the smartest person associated with the Carcassa."

 _Is he…no, he's not complimenting Skull, he's insulting the Carcassa._ "So why'd they fire him if he's so good?"

"Because Legiérre assumed that Skull's position was pointless, an excuse for a jewel in his crown."

"Because he was one of the Arcobaleno!" Gokudera said, a bit too loudly. "Um…so once they learned the curse had been broken, they tossed him out, not realizing that he actually isn't just an idiot. Or not _totally_ an idiot."

"And a few months later, an anonymous individual sends data to not only the Italian police, but to the governments of seven other countries, that indicated the source of a large amount of the drug trade in local towns. Their warehouses were raided, their boss arrested, and the family has for the most part fallen to pieces."

Tsuna froze, and looked at Reborn out of the edge of his eye. "You don't think Skull…"

"But that would be a violation of Omertà," Gokudera said, although he didn't sound certain of it. "To give information to the police, even as an act of revenge. I'd think even that idiot Skull would realize it, that to violate the code of silence is the same as making his life forfeit."

Tsuna shuddered, at both Gokudera's words and the look on Reborn's face that suggested that he wasn't quite so confident in Skull's intelligence. _Man, the members of what used to be Carcassa would be after him—at least the Vindice are too busy taking care of the Pacifiers to bother with him._

He jumped a foot in the air when Reborn started talking. "The Vindice are still active as enforcers of Mafia Law. Just because the Arcobaleno System has been disposed of, doesn't mean they aren't still keeping an eye on the Tri-ni-Sette."

"Okay seriously how did you do that?"

"I've told you before, I can read minds."

Tsuna shook his head. _I have personal experience indicating that that is not true! Urgh._ "So, Skull got fired because he's no longer an Arcobaleno? How's your job security then?"

"Hmph. I worked for the Vongola long before I was ever cursed," Reborn said, and took a sip of his espresso.

"Oh, stop talking like an old man! You're an infant, how long could you have possibly been working for the Ninth?" He shook his head again, stood up, and said "I'll be back in a minute, I want to get the Asahi Newspaper." He walked away to the front of the café, muttering to himself.

When he was out the door, Yamamoto leaned in conspiratorially. "By the way, Chrome, you're out."

She frowned. "What? How long has it been?"

"You bet 100 days, right? And Basil bet…five months, I think."

"The answer is that it's been about four and a half months," Gokudera said, glaring at Yamamoto. "130 days or so."

Kyoko and Haru had the same look of confusion on their faces, and nobody was bothering to explain to them. Haru finally leaned toward Chrome and said "130 days since what? And you were…gambling on something?"

Chrome went pink. "Um, well...did boss—I mean, did Tsuna tell either of you about the Arcobaleno Curse? Well, it was one hundred and thirty days ago that the curse was broken."

"Okay," Kyoko muttered. "But what's the terms of the bet?"

"We-ell," Chrome said, stretching the word out as far as it could go. "So during that final battle of the Rainbow Conflict, there was a person who appeared to help Tsuna. I was only just conscious, but even I saw that it was…" She sighed, and pulled out her phone—a cheap flip phone that was already battered and scraped up from her dropping it constantly. She opened up the messages and went to an old one with a photo attachment. "This is the man that helped Tsuna." Kyoko and Haru leaned in close to take a look at the photo taken by a certain apple-headed illusionist even in the middle of a life or death situation. It took only a moment before Kyoko's eyes went wide. Haru looked from the photo, up to Reborn, and back to the photo. She was turning red as a tomato.

"So Tsuna's the only one of us who hasn't made the connection yet," Yamamoto said, and laughed. "I guess Super Intuition only gets you so far."

Kyoko spoke up as Haru tried to cover her face. "So, the bet is…how long will it take for Tsuna to make the connection? And he still hasn't? But, brother, even you…"

Ryohei looked at her sternly. "Oi, what's that supposed to mean, 'even you'?"

"I mean you're not the most perceptive…"

Yamamoto cut in before it could turn into an argument. "Everyone put in ten thousand yen—the kid's suggestion. Whoever gets the closest wins it all. Gokudera had the most confidence in Tsuna; he figured that Tsuna was just being polite by not saying anything." Gokudera was muttering to himself about how everyone has their quirks and the Tenth was no less great because he missed that one thing. "I figured he'd make the connection after the adrenaline wore off—nope. Ryohei bet a week, Chrome a hundred days like I said. Next was Basil, five months, then Tsuna's dad, six months."

"Shameful," Gokudera muttered at that.

"Apparently Dino went for exactly 246 days, I think he said that it's the time it took for him to make the same connection. Lal Mirch said ten months, Colonnello a year, and the kid bet on…"

"Ten years," Reborn said with a smile. "And I'm confident."

"I feel like I'm committing treason," Gokudera said. "Keeping secrets from the boss…"

"Oh, it's just a little fun," Yamamoto said, grinning. "Hup, Tsuna's coming back, act natural."

Chrome slid her phone away, and the boss was none the wiser.

* * *

A week later, Tsuna was blinking himself away and groaning at some kid standing on the arm of the couch and yelling at him in a panic. Tsuna squinted, and blinked again. He was sitting on the couch, still in his street clothes, and a textbook was on his lap, but the clock on the wall said that it was nearly one AM.

"Well?" said the kid, and Tsuna turned his attention back to him.

"Skull? What are you doing here?"

A twitch racked Skull's entire body. "I just explained that to you!"

"Um…I'm pretty sure I was sleeping up until a second ago."

He could just make out Skull blinking in confusion beneath his visor.

It was one AM and Tsuna was tired and his brain hurt from studying until he fell asleep. "Look, Skull, I need sleep, so you can explain or I'm going to bed."

"You were sleeping with your eyes open?" Skull said in disbelief.

 _…Oh I had just forgotten about that._ "Apparently. I need a sleep mask."

Skull turned away from Tsuna and pulled off his helmet in order to process this information. He turned back around a moment later. Tsuna nearly flinched when he saw the half-healed burn scars across Skull's face. "You help people, Vongola?"

"Uh…"

Skull spoke quickly and frantically. "The last pathetic pieces of the Carcassa are after my ass and the Vindice are hunting me and it's been made clear that they aren't going to go easy for breaking Omertà when I _didn't break Omertà!_ "

Tsuna screwed up his face in concentration. "…Oh, right. So you didn't report your boss to the police in revenge for getting fired?"

Skull shushed him furiously. "If _he_ knows I'm here, I don't know what he'll do!"

 _He? Oh, duh. Yeah, I guess Reborn wouldn't be happy to know he's here._ "Okay, then if you didn't tell the police what the Carcassa were up to, then who did?"

"Riccio Alavari," Skull said instantly. Tsuna raised an eyebrow. "He was a new hire that was spying on the Carcassa, under the guise of being a subordinate. I was on the verge of finding proof when they fired me." He gestured to the burn scars on his face, and Tsuna was reminded all at once why he _hated_ the mafia. "So he's hiding out in Yokohama and I need help to search his apartment and find proof that he was a spy!"

"Why did you come to me, then? I'm just some stupid middle schooler."

"You beat the snot out of a Vindice! And you seem like a decent person even if you're a boss…"

"I'm not a boss!"

Skull ignored him in favor of begging. "Please Vongola? I'm begging here, all you need to do is stand there and look tough, I'll pay for your bus ticket and owe you every favor from now until the end of time. Please, they'll kill me!"

 _Number one least able to refuse a request._ "Oh for the love of—fine. I'm guessing this is the kind of thing that needs to happen ASAP? Forget the bus ticket, let me get my gloves and we can fly." _Stand there and look tough? I'm a shrimp with toothpicks for arms, how do I look tough?_

He closed up his book, crept quietly up the stairs, and stepped into his room. The light was off, and he could just make out Reborn sleeping in his hammock. Tsuna walked slowly and quietly, set his book down, grabbed a scrap piece of paper, and scribbled out a note. _Skull asked for a favor. Headed out to Yokohama, will be back before school starts._ He signed it with a doodled tuna fish dangling from a hook.

He taped the note to his door, grabbed his gloves and pills from his pocket, and slipped them on as he walked back downstairs.

"So where's this mole Alavari hiding out?"

* * *

 _A/N: In the continuity of this fic, the Carcassa are not only big into drug-trafficking, but they were one of the biggest names in the business so to speak, mostly in Italy but also in Greece, France, Libya, Egypt, among other countries, mostly countries on the Mediterranean. As much as the corruption and the influence of the mob on the police might have made it difficult to bust the Carcassa for drug trafficking, once these other countries found out that the Carcassa was dealing drugs in their countries they were able to at least put pressure on the Italian Government to bust the Carcassa._

 _Next time, the exciting middle part, Rainbow Curiosities Part 2!_


	7. Rainbow Curiosities Part 2

_A/N: Frustrated to admit that this is a rather short chapter. Not as bad as when I started writing fanfic (try 1200 word chapters :D), but less than I would like. Just one of those cases where I wrote everything that I wanted to complete the plot, and while I supposed I could have combined parts 2 and 3 of Rainbow Curiosities into one chapter, while the theme is similar enough (what some of the former Arcobaleno are up to four months after the curse was broken), the tone, topics, and events are so far divorced from each other it just wouldn't feel right._

 _In this chapter, it's mentioned that Namimori is in Kanagawa Prefecture. The capital of the Kanagawa Prefecture is Yokohama, which is like a half-hour drive away from Tokyo. I kind of agonized over this placement, because I didn't want to just put in the same area as Tokyo, but at the same time with the geography of Namimori as given in the series-within biking distance of both the beach and a mountain, but still pretty flat overall-I felt like I didn't have a lot of choice in the matter. As a note: when it comes to distances, I'm probably going to be using miles instead of kilometers because I cannot visualize kilometers like I can miles, and according to the traffic page it's mostly Americans reading anyways. Call it artistic liberty._

 _Wanted to give a quick thanks to everyone who's followed or reviewed or favorited, I haven't had a lot of success with my writing lately and it makes me giggle with joy when I get a follow alert._

 **Target 7: Rainbow Curiosities Part 2**

If there was one good thing with no strings attached that came out of the Rainbow Conflict, it was certainly that Tsuna discovered his love of flying. Back and forth between the forest hideaway in Nara Prefecture where Talbot had been hidden away, and all over Namimori afterwards, it was a lot of time for thinking, and even better an opportunity to go simply as fast as he could with no restraints. And it wasn't slow, either—if the readout on his contacts was correct, he had briefly broken the sound barrier on the way back from Nara.

He didn't reach nearly such speeds on this trip to Yokohama. Part of it was that it was a far shorter trip—Namimori was located in the western part of Kanagawa Prefecture, about 200 miles away from the Nara Hideout, but only about 35 miles away from the capital city of Yokohama. The larger part of it was Skull desperately clinging to his shoulder for dear life. Tsuna had promised him that he would catch him if he fell, but that had been of little relief. He was only just short of screaming.

Even as they flew over the city, Tsuna tried to get more detailed information out of him to no success. He rolled his eyes and said into his headphones "Navigation."

" _Understood, boss."_

"Yoko-Q Building." A marker appeared on the map projected into the contacts. _That last upgrade Spanner sent is absurd…_ "Thanks," he said. _Thank god Skull's too out of it to ask about thanking an AI._

The Yoko-Q Building was a mix of apartments, lofts, and a few private offices on the uppermost floors. Tsuna briefly considered going to ground level, but even at 2 AM there could still be some peering eyes wondering who that kid outside the window was. He took a moment to make sure the roof was empty, and landed easy—he could have landed much harder with no trouble, but Skull sounded about ready to throw up inside his helmet.

Skull fell off Tsuna's shoulder, and Tsuna took a deep breath to suspend Hyper Dying Will Mode. He kept his gloves on, and made sure that the Dying Will Pills were easily accessible. He looked over at Skull, who seemed a bit unsteady. "You okay?"

"Mm-mm."

"If you say so. You know what floor this, what was it, Alavari? What floor his apartment's on?" Tsuna asked, as he checked the time on his watch. Not for the first time he wished he had a cell phone.

Skull shook off the last bits of the motion sickness. "Apartment 2724."

"You want a ride? No flying this time."

Skull tried to figure out whether Tsuna was laughing at him before taking the offered shoulder. Tsuna pulled open the door that gave roof access—even in his normal state, he could easily break the rusty lock that held it closed. He made a mental note to leave a message at the manager's office after this was taken care of.

They were on the 40th floor, but the one thing Tsuna and Skull could agree on was to keep away from security cameras, which would be far more difficult in an elevator. There were far fewer video cameras in the stairwell, and Skull knew how to navigate blind spots—and where there were no blind spots, Nuts could leap from Tsuna's outstretched arm and obscure the camera with his mane of sky flames.

At the 27th floor, Tsuna pushed out into the hallway. The hallway lights were on, but all was quiet. It was a pretty bleak place, the walls all white and with no special features on the doors besides the apartment number in Arabic numerals. "Twenty-seven forty-eight…" Nuts vanished back into his ring, and Tsuna walked quietly, shushing Skull every time he counted out the apartment number. They went all the way through the building, past the elevator, and to the opposite end before coming upon room 2724.

Tsuna looked either way, then put his ear against the door. He closed his eyes, and emptied his lungs. _Nothing…nothing…nothing…no, that's a keyboard!_ He whispered "There's somebody in there, typing."

Skull lurched, nearly falling over, then leaped off Tsuna's shoulder straight at the door. Tsuna could just perceive a wave of Dying Will Flames emitted by Skull as he knocked the door right off its hinges and storm inside. "You no good traitor ruining my good name!" he shouted out, pointing a finger accusingly at the man inside.

 _Oh my god that was his plan are you kidding me this guy really is an idiot._ He downed the Dying Will Pills that he had tucked into his palm, and the Vongola Gear was equipped in a flash of light.

The man inside jumped up, pulled a gun out of his waistband, and fired straight at Skull. The bullet went straight through his visor and into his frontal lobe, and Skull was down just like that. The gunman turned his aim on Tsuna, but he wasn't nearly fast enough to keep up with Vongola's Tenth.

Tsuna leaped forward, grabbed the muzzle of the gun, and yanked it out of the man's hands. "Are you Alavari?"

The light of his dying will flames reflected in the gunman's eyes. There was no fear in those eyes. As Tsuna's eyes flicked to Skull, the gunman expertly flipped backward, kicking up on Tsuna's chin and yanking the boy's head upward. The gunman landed his flip and ran to the window while Tsuna was still stunned. He pushed the window open, gave Tsuna a mocking wave, and flipped himself out from the twenty-seventh story window.

 _No no no this is just a normal person!_ He ran to the window and nearly threw himself out after the man, but noticed just in time that it hadn't been fanatically suicidal leap—there was a balcony two stories down that the man had landed on safely, and he was gone.

Tsuna was nearly tempted to go after him, but forced himself to remember why he was here—and that Skull had gotten shot in the head.

The former Arcobaleno had already yanked his helmet off and was moaning on the floor. His face was covered in his own blood, but the wound was already healing. "Ooooh, I haaate getting shot…least the exit wound is clean…"

"The stuntman hated by the grim reaper, I guess Enma wasn't kidding," Tsuna said, somewhat amazed by this superhuman ability of Skull's. He shook his head, and his Dying Will Flame faded as he walked to the computer.

"Uuugh…I need to kick that guy's ass when I'm…uh…what's the word?"

"Taller?"

"Yeah."

The gunman hadn't had time to lock his computer, and it was still open to his email. The one he had been composing was asking some transporter about a fake passport. Tsuna saved the draft and went to the inbox. _Junk mail, junk mail…come on, instructions or an informal contract…oh hey, that looks interesting._

Near to the bottom of the inbox was a pair of emails, one from a bank confirming a wire transfer into the recipient's account for an amount that made Tsuna nearly start yelling in frustration, and the other from a "JohnDoe909" with a subject reading "Re: Carcassa Shipping Group" and a short message in the body that said "For services rendered." Just after both was a confirmation email for a plane ticket from Palermo, Italy, to Tokyo.

"I guess you were right after all. Look, 'for services rendered', that's code for industrial espionage, right?"

Skull wiped off his face on his sleeve, leaving his destroyed helmet on the floor, and hopped up onto the desk, squinting to look. In spite of getting hunted across half the world, dragged at high speed across Japan, and getting shot in the face again, he lit up. "This is it, Vongola! I'm not gonna die yet!" He pushed Tsuna aside and rapidly started printing out copies of the emails. He started muttering to himself in…German, Tsuna was pretty sure.

"Right, glad I could help," Tsuna said, although Skull didn't seem to be paying attention any more. He rubbed the back of his head. "So, do you need me to stick around? Or you want a lift back to Namimori?"

Skull shuddered at the very suggestion.

"Right, well, see you around, I guess." _I guess I went from prospective Tenth to…a stuntman's lacky? Great…wait did I just help Skull perform counter-espionage? Oh god. No favor is worth it._

He was out the window and away before he could continue thinking about it too hard. Just as he was going over the city limits, he said into the headphones "Time trial."

" _Understood, boss. Beginning time trial at your mark._ "

He reoriented himself with movements of his hands that were, by now, instinctive. "Mark." The timer started, and Tsuna flew like a meteor through the night sky.

* * *

Tsuna didn't pay much attention to what time it was on the way back home. He snuck back inside the house as quietly as he had left, jumped in the shower, and grabbed a late-night snack before falling into bed.

It felt like he had no more than blinked before he was getting the daily assassination threats to get out of bed. It had been more like two hours, but after flying back and forth to Yokohama overnight, he could barely open his eyes.

When he finally pulled himself up, he grimaced when he saw that Reborn was looking at the note he had left on the desk the night before. "Hey, like I said, I got back before school."

For once, Reborn seemed at a loss for words. After hesitating a few long moment, he finally asked "How is Yokohama this time of year?"

"In my experience? Cold, but I was at about a thousand feet up and over the ocean for part of it." He started pulling on his uniform. "The word of the day is industrial espionage. Skull had been suspicious of the guy but wasn't able to find any proof of ill-intent before he got fired—did you know that that involves literally setting him on fire? I hope that's only the Carcassa, but even for a drug cartel that's disturbing." He shivered. "He tracked the guy to Japan with security footage. Showed up here last night—Skull, not the spy—and asked for my help. The guy jumped out his apartment window to a balcony but left his computer open to emails with payments for 'services rendered'. At least Skull seemed confident that it would save him from the Vindice."

Reborn frowned, and looked at the note again. "I'm surprised the coward would come anywhere near this town. He seems to think I'm strict when it comes to the law of the mafia."

"He did seem a little terrified of you," Tsuna said, biting back any comments about exactly how strict Reborn was. "But, knowing you, I'm pretty sure he would have been fine. You'd lose your favorite lackey otherwise."

"You need some more brain cells shot out, you're getting too smart."

"Shouldn't a boss know how his subordinate's thought process works?"

There was dead silence as both Tsuna and Reborn registered exactly what Tsuna just said.

 _Did I just call Reborn my subordinate?_

Tsuna was out the window faster than you could say 'shotgun'. Reborn shook his head, sighed, and said "So much for intelligence." He scooped his hat off the desk, and examined it before putting it on. The edge of the brim was becoming worn, and the band was getting a touch frayed in the back. He made a mental note to get it replaced the next time a courier came.

* * *

 _A/N: Next time, another weirdo? The Back-Alley Doctor Kappa Appears in the conclusion to Rainbow Curiosities!_


	8. Rainbow Curiosities Part 3

_A/N:_ _When I first started plotting this story, I was not going to have the Arcobaleno Trials Arc and the Inheritance Succession Arc be canon to this fic's timeline. I changed my mind. While there's still some parts that are pretty stupid, and it kind of cheapened the emotional impact of returning to the present day at the end of the arc, it also so heavily shaped how I tend to write a lot of characters that I almost have to make it in line with this. I might write out a blog post outlining my headcanons that make it less stupid, but none of that will come up here. All you need to know is that Verde tried to kill the other Arcobaleno, once._

 _EDIT 12/9/15: Changed some of the described heights of characters upon learning that the child characters in this series should not be that short. As of Target 8, Lambo is 124 cm tall, I-pin is 113 cm tall, not 42 and 45 cm tall. For the majority of the series, Reborn is 45 cm tall, and he and the other Arcobaleno are effectively newborns, not one year old. Note to prospective fanfic writers, the Reborn wiki is a horrible source of information._

 **Target 8: Rainbow Curiosities Part 3**

"Oh, mom, I can get it, go sit down."

"Dear, are you sure?"

"Yes I'm sure! Ugh, I'm not that clumsy," Tsuna said as he picked up the first three bowls of rice and balanced them along his arm. "Least not any more, I'm not…" He set them down in front of his mother, Bianchi, and Fuuta, then went back for the grilled tuna.

"Oi, serve your tutor first," Reborn said with a frown.

"Nope, oldest to youngest, and Fuuta's older than you. And then there's I-Pin," he set down her plates, and she carefully sounded out 'i-ta-da-ki-ma-su'. "Who is getting better every day at Japanese and is also six months older than Lambo." He set down the bowls, and Lambo started grabbing the food and shoving it into his mouth with his bare hands. Tsuna grabbed the next set of bowls and went to set them down in front of his tutor's seat. "And then Rebo-gah!" Right as he had set the bowls down, Reborn had smacked the back of his hand with a Leon-colored ruler, leaving a red mark. "Ow-ow-ow why did you do that? Ugh, what drinks does everybody want?"

"Juice," came a resounding chorus from Fuuta, I-Pin, and Lambo.

"Beer, please," Bianchi said, as she worked out numbers on a pad of paper.

Tsuna pulled it all out, along with a glass of non-alcoholic beer (he suspected that Reborn knew that it wasn't actually alcoholic, but thus far hadn't given any hint of it), and said "Mom? Uh…what are you looking at?"

Nana was staring intently at Tsuna with her head tilted to the side. "Hmm…"

"What, is it a spider?"

"No, no. But, I think you've gotten a little taller…"

"Oh, well, if that's all…"

"And now that I look carefully, I think I-Pin's grown a little too, and Fuuta's taller, I'm sure of it." She pushed her seat out and stood up. "Alright, come on, let's go check!"

"But what about dinner?" Tsuna said, as his stomach growled, both of which fell on deaf ears as Fuuta, I-Pin, and Lambo followed Nana to the doorframe leading to the entry hall covered in tick marks in orange crayon.

"Ooh, me! Do me!" Fuuta shouted, pressing himself against the doorframe.

"Hm…let's see, you were blue last time? A-ha, I was right!" She marked off a line at the level of his head, a couple centimeters above the first one from when Fuuta has first come to stay with them, and scrawled the date. "You see? Oh, you're just going to spring up, I know it."

 _Now that I think about it, he really is,_ Tsuna thought, recalling how Fuuta of ten years in the future had practically towered over him.

I-Pin stepped up next, and Nana marked her height in red—color per her own request. "Oh, just about two or three centimeters, I think." Lambo pushed I-Pin aside and stood against the wall, standing up on his tiptoes. "Dear Lambo, you have to stay on your heels for me to measure you. Although…" She had a green crayon in hand, and checked the line. "Hm….actually, I think I might have measured you as too tall last time. I couldn't tell through all your hair, but now that it's shorter I can see that I measured about three centimeters too high!"

Tsuna couldn't see Lambo's face from his angle, but he could just picture the tears welling up. He slid over and said quickly "Oh, mom, I think you're wrong, he _has_ grown, check it again." He kneeled down and lifted Lambo up under his arms. Lambo's face was red, and he wiped his snot on Tsuna's sleeve.

Nana smiled, and marked off a line. "Oh, you're right, look, you've grown about twelve centimeters!"

"Gyahaha, Lambo is the beeest at growing tall!" Lambo shouted out, flailing his arms and legs to try and take a look. Tsuna set him down and pulled his snot-stained hoodie off.

"Your turn, Tsuna."

"Mo-om, don't you think I'm a little old for that kind of stuff?"

"No," she said without a hint of hesitation or irony. "Now come over here." She started digging out the orange crayon as Tsuna took a look at the old markings. They started when he was 5 and begged his mother to measure his height, and the latest one was nearly a year previous. _The last mark is at eye-level now…_ He carefully backed against the doorframe. "My, you need a haircut, too. Let's see, right about, here. Oh, look, you've grown nearly ten centimeters just in the past year! Oh, my little boy is growing up so fast!" She grabbed him by the shoulders and hugged him tight.

"Mom, come on, it's only a growth spurt…"

"Hmph, and at 15 I would have thought you would have finished growing," Reborn said. "Just a very, very late bloomer."

Tsuna looked over at Reborn and a wicked idea started sprouting. _That's right…since the curse was broken, he should be aging like a normal human._ "Hey, mom, what about Reborn? Shouldn't we check his height?"

"Absolutely!" she said, smiling brightly. "Come now, Reborn. Let's see…oh, I don't think we've measured you yet. But, not too late to start."

"Forty-five centimeters," Bianchi said with a smile. "And use yellow."

She marked off a line while referencing a sewing tape measure. "Perfect. Reborn, shoes and hat off to measure your height."

Reborn rolled his eyes and hopped down from his chair. He set his hat on his seat, and kicked his shoes directly in Tsuna's face, leaving a red mark, and stood at the doorframe. "Both you and Tsuna need haircuts, I think," she said, comparing the front of his head to the back. "Yes, Tsuna, you've got a good eye. My, you've grown quite a bit! Just short of sixty centimeters. You'll need new clothes."

"Not like he's had to replace them twice in the last four months," Tsuna said, snickering, and dodged another smack in the face.

"Alright, everybody sit down for dinner—oh, where did they run off to," Nana said, setting the crayons back in the basket on the hall table and brushing herself off to go look for the children. Bianchi started picking up plates and taking them over to the kitchen.

Reborn replaced his hat and looked at the two yellow marks on the doorframe. "Hmph. It wasn't just Lal after all, then."

"You didn't trust Checkerface, I mean, Uncle Kawahira, to hold up his end of the deal?"

"Would you?"

"…I guess I see what you mean," Tsuna said, even if he didn't agree; while he knew that Kawahira was a deceptive individual by nature, his gut said to give everyone the benefit of the doubt. _Although, while he hasn't wronged me personally, I guess it's different for Reborn, being under the Arcobaleno Curse for so long because of Checkerface._ He frowned. _And, before Talbot showed up, he was ready to make me the first of the next generation of Arcobaleno._ He put a hand to his chest, imagining the weight of the pacifier around his neck.

 _"Hiya,"_ he had said, cheerfully, as though he weren't about to commit murder. He had expressed regret for his actions, sure, but neither had he ever apologized, to anyone. Tsuna shook his head. _It's in the past now. It's over, and everyone's okay. Just need to stop thinking about that stuff, it'll give me a stress ulcer._

He picked his utensils and was just about to start digging in when a knock came at the front door. He groaned. "I got it."

* * *

Standing outside was a twenty-something with big round glasses and a lapel pin embossed with an alligator and latin text around the edges. The visitor wore an ill-fitting suit; if there had been a tie with it, it was long since abandoned. A briefcase was slung over their shoulder, battered and dented from being tossed around.

Also, Tsuna could not tell whether they were a man or a woman, but considering the sticker on the briefcase that had a combination of the male and female gender symbols on a Transgender Pride Flag background, the androgyny was probably intentional.

"Hello, I'm from the Berude Babysitter's Union, I'm looking for a child about yea tall, goes by the name Reborn? He's been missing for a while now and I'm getting worried something might have happened," they said, completely deadpan.

Tsuna narrowed his eyes. "Missing for…two years?"

"Around that, yeah, our record-keeping isn't the greatest."

"Reborn! There's someone here to see you!" he shouted over his shoulder, then turned back to the visitor. "Uh…do you work for Verde?"

A sly look came over their face. "Now how'd you know that? I'd heard something about the famed Vongola intuition, but that's a bit of a stretch for a guess."

"Well it's not so much being good at guessing as it is just picking up on micro-expressions and—but anyways." He pointed at the pin on their lapel.

They frowned. "Oh, yeah. I'd forgotten I was wearing that. Micro-expressions? Care to clarify?" There was a wicked gleam in their eye that made Tsuna's skin crawl.

"That's a Vongola Family secret; try to dissect him and I'll put a bullet through the hand doing the cutting." Reborn looked far from pleased to see this person at the door.

"Oh, I'm not my boss, I don't kill people. Now if he were already dead, then that would just be a waste of good data."

"Excuse me, who are you?" Tsuna said impatiently, stepping into the scientist's line of sight.

"Kappa. Dr. Verde's babysitter, sometimes assistant."

"And always too fond of syringes. Tsuna, go do your homework."

"But my food…" His stomach growled again, but Reborn was already on his way up the stairs. He sighed. "Alright, Kappa, follow me—wait, actually, uh—" He checked to make sure his mother wasn't in earshot, then said "I need to ask if you have any weapons on your person? This is still my house."

Kappa smirked. "Smart man, Vongola." They reached into their jacket and pulled out a violet prototype box weapon and a ring inlaid with a small amethyst. From their sleeve came a folded butterfly knife. All of these were given to Tsuna to keep them secure. "Lead the way, Vongola."

To his consternation, Kappa didn't bother taking off their shoes before coming in, but the comment about syringes left him a little wary.

"Mm, never been in Japan before, beautiful country."

"…Then why do you speak Japanese?"

"Foreign language credit. That and Japan becoming an economic powerhouse over the last few decades makes it if not mandatory then heavily encouraged. For both scientists and, ah, businessmen."

 _So businessmen are Mafiosi, then._ He pushed his way into his room, sat down at his table, and got a smack from Reborn.

"Like I said, do your homework."

Tsuna squinted, grabbed his textbook from the backpack behind him, and opened it up to a page with loose leaf paper already tucked inside. Reborn was sitting on top of the table to his right, and Kappa shut the door and took a seat across from Reborn.

"I thought I'd made it clear that neither Verde nor his subordinates were welcome here. One of the benefits of being un-cursed, after all, was never having to deal with him again."

"Well, I wouldn't know anything about that," Kappa said, with a shrug. "But he sent me anyways to share a bit of information, if you're interested. But, first, I have to ask, would you be willing to contribute a blood sample for the sake of further research?"

"Over my dead body."

"Understandable." Kappa popped open the briefcase, then looked at Tsuna, who was following the action curiously. "Hey, Vongola, ever heard of doctor-patient confidentiality? I mean technically I'm not bound to it because I never got my medical license, but it's the principle that counts."

Tsuna blinked, picked his pencil back up, and looked back at his math homework, glancing up every so often. _A back alley doctor? Yikes…_

"So, was there something interesting from that testing he insisted on a while back?"

"Dead fascinating," Kappa said, as they pulled out a file marked with an _R._ "Although…that might be a bad word to use…" Kappa flipped through the file and pulled out a chart. "You know anything about hormones, Mr. Reborn? There's one in the human body called growth hormone. Not just the kind that athletes use to dope, mind you, but it is naturally produced by the body, along with another hormone that counters its action. Growth hormone production is at its highest when you're born, decreases until puberty, then just about drops off once you're in your 20s. By measuring the secretion of Growth Hormone and its counter, you can estimate the age of a living subject by comparing their level of growth hormone secretion to baseline values."

"Why'd you test for that, he's six months old and that's easy enough," Tsuna said, and managed to avoid getting hit for looking away from his homework.

"Good question. Testing for it was just being thorough. The good doctor Verde wanted to make sure that there wasn't anything fishy going on."

 _So Reborn wasn't the only one suspicious of Uncle Kawahira…_

"But, something pretty neat came up." They set down a pair of papers on the table. "The first one here indicates the levels of Human Growth Hormone in a normal human. The second, third, and fourth here come from Dr. Verde, _Sergente_ Colonnello, and that one from the Varia, Mammon. Not necessarily representative of your exact situation, but it's a decent sample. So, within a week of the curse being broken, the subjects' bodies adapted and began producing growth hormone at a rate consistent with that of a newborn. Really, between the massive flame potential being released, and your body suddenly working through processes it hadn't touched in a long time, it's no wonder that you became ill, Mr. Reborn."

Tsuna's head shot up, and he looked from Kappa to Reborn. "You got sick after your curse was removed? Are you okay?"

Reborn leaped up and kicked Tsuna hard enough in the forehead to knock his student onto his back and leave a red mark on his forehead. "Don't get that stupid face. It was a fever." As Tsuna was getting up, Reborn shot a glare at Kappa. Kappa didn't seem to notice.

"Mm-hm, a fever of 102 Fahrenheit and passing out several times, certainly nothing to worry about, just a head cold," Kappa muttered. "But, even that passed, and all seemed normal. But, take a look at the chart, compare the values for Dr. Verde and _Sergente_ Colonnello, and you'll notice a discrepancy. Their growth hormone levels at three months, are closer to the level of an eight-month-old." They took Tsuna's pencil and marked the y axis to demonstrate.

"So, the former Arcobaleno are growing quickly?" Tsuna said, after looking back and forth between the graphs several times.

"It would appear so," Kappa said, and adjusted their glasses, making them appear opaque. "Since the curve is consistent, just squashed inwards, I'd say a rate approximately three times that of a normal child."

Reborn had been silent for a minute processing the information. He was frowning. "Will that effect lifespan?"

"Good question. Unlikely. Obviously, this is unprecedented. But, you have to keep in mind that hormones like these only effect _growth_. Meanwhile, _aging_ is an entirely different process. Aging is a combination of the effect of a lifetime of use and abuse on the body, and damage caused to one's DNA as a result of a lifetime of DNA replication to allow cell divisions. But there's no indication of any damage being caused by the relatively faster cell division. So, best guess? It'll go rapidly until you hit puberty, then level off. Effect on lifespan would be at most a few years under average—assuming a natural demise."

"There goes my height advantage," Tsuna muttered.

"That's a lot of free information," Reborn said darkly. His eyes were shaded by the brim of his hat. "What are you expecting in return for it?"

Kappa raised an eyebrow at Reborn, and chuckled as they picked up the papers and set them back into the folder. "I'd have thought it was obvious. The good doctor, he's too proud to admit it, but he feels like he owes you—both of you—big time. He's pretty eager to get that debt squared away."

Something about the idea of that made Tsuna's stomach twist up in knots. "Because I really want help from that kind of person. It's not like he tried to murder the other Arcobaleno, steal the Vongola Rings, attack all of us with box weapons and robots, and electrocuted Lambo sufficiently to call down a bolt of Lightning. Oh, wait."

"If it makes you feel any better, that set back his research by at least a few years and has made him absolutely terrified of your Lightning Guardian." Kappa grinned madly.

"…not really, but I'll keep that in mind."

Kappa shrugged. "Whatever. So, Mr. Reborn, any questions? No? Excellent, I have a plane to catch. Show me to the door, Vongola?"

"Uh…sure," Tsuna said. His head was practically spinning. He picked himself up, leaving Reborn to consider the information.

* * *

When they got to the door, Kappa gestured for him to follow outside. Tsuna slipped on his shoes and closed the front door behind him. Kappa was frowning. "I've been working for Dr. Verde for nearly 8 years now. Met him when I was just a struggling grad student working in a diner; when he came in for early morning coffee, I was too exhausted to question why an infant and an alligator had come in, and treated him like any other person. I eventually recognized him for his work in practical psycho-physics, he corrected a homework problem I was doing between tables, I mentioned that I was having difficulty getting money for school, and he offered me a job as his assistant on the spot. I might make jokes about being his babysitter, but the fact is, I owe him a lot. And I would have missed him if he'd died a few months back. So, thanks, Vongola. You seem like a good kid."

"Don't mention it. It wasn't just me, my family, the other bosses, heck apparently even Verde delayed Jäger a few minutes while I was recovering. I couldn't have done anything without everyone."

Kappa shook their head and spat. "Humble bastard, forget it. Look, I've heard you've got some pretty good mechanics on the payroll, but if you ever need the help of a back-alley doctor," Kappa said, and shoved a piece of paper at Tsuna with an international phone number scrawled on it. "Give me a call."

Tsuna put it away, returned Kappa's ring, knife, and box weapon, and shivered at the idea of ever being so desperate as to need the help of a back-alley doctor.

* * *

"Adel, come on!"

"I said no! I'm of a mind to kill him for daring to come back, after the danger he brought you into!"

"Do you really think he meant to? I'm pretty sure that if he'd known there was a chance of getting his face punched out he would have been as far away as possible!"

Skull was inching his way out of the room, hoping to god nobody saw him. And then Enma turned around and gestured towards him. "He told me he has experience as a bodyguard, he moonlighted as one before he was cursed. And I'm pretty sure he's immortal; and even after he took the Varia's attacks he was still able to move, so he has no reason not to take a bullet for the person he's guarding."

Skull started sweating at the thought.

"Please, Adel? He's just like us, thrown under the bus by the mafia through no fault of his own."

"Urgh…" She looked around at the rest of the Guardians. Most were watching the job interview with interest and wondering if it was going to get violent. "Are there any objections to hiring Skull as a bodyguard—on a _trial basis,_ " she emphasized. There were none. "Fine. Skull, you'll be accompanying me to a business meeting tomorrow, understand?"

"Y-yes Ice Queen—I mean Miss Suzuki." Skull couldn't help but feel like he had made a terrible mistake, crawling to the Shimon Family to ask for a job.

* * *

 _A/N: I liked writing Kappa, even if they might not be involved for...uh, ever. Only if there is actually a need for the character. For the moment, the entire point of Kappa's character was to provide the excuse to have Reborn grow up faster. Because...I'm one of those kinds of fans._

 _Here ends Rainbow Curiosities. Next time, in a bonus chapter, we take a look back at one of the most important days of Tsuna's life. One year ago, September 15th, 2008, Tsuna defeated the Kokuyo Gang and awakened his Hyper Intuition._


	9. What They Did on September 19th

**Target 9: Bonus Chapter: What They Did on September 19th**

 _Tsuna_

Tsuna was out of bed and out the door long before anybody else in the house was so much as awake. Just as the sun was rising, he was walking along the road that led out of town, to the long abandoned health center about halfway between Namimori and Kokuyo.

There was a new lock on the gate, but Bianchi wasn't here this time with a Sakura Mochi to melt the steel. Tsuna was left with carefully climbing over the gate, and dropping down to the other side with a _hup_. He skirted around the area that looked flat but had the greenhouse underneath, where Yamamoto had knocked out Ken Joshima. Neither M.M. nor Birds appeared to block his way. In the plaza leading up to the main building, there were still ruts in the ground from the fight that had taken place there. Tsuna thought of Lancia, and clutched the dragon ring in one hand as he walked into the main building. Gokudera had held off Chikusa in the second floor hallway, and there was still rubble from the dynamite detonation—especially in front of the cell where, Tsuna had been told afterwards, Hibari had been held after being defeated.

The theater was empty.

Tsuna stepped inside as gingerly as he had the first time, one year earlier.

Mukuro Rokudo was not sitting on the couch up on the stage. Fuuta did not appear from behind him, his eyes blank and an ornamental dagger in hand. Gokudera and Bianchi and Ken and Chikusa and Hibari didn't stand up with words in their eyes and their faces fractured to come after him.

Tsuna flexed his fingers. The air seemed thick with dust and memories.

He touched his forehead where the Rebuke Bullet had struck home.

 _It's been exactly one year since I fought Mukuro Rokudo. That was the first time in my life I've ever felt strong. That I thought I could do something with myself._

He nearly laughed at himself. "Man, good thing I came here so early. Reborn wouldn't exactly like the sentimentality." He stepped into the middle of the theater, mindful of the warped and rotting planks. He closed his eyes. "'Declare your true feelings. That is the answer of a Vongola.' Man, didn't that start a bad habit. Not the only one that started that day, when everything changed."

Tsuna checked his watch. He still had plenty of time to get to school; he could be alone with his thoughts for a little longer.

 _Reborn_

He wasn't stupid; the moment he woke and noticed that his student was gone, Reborn could guess where Tsuna had gone at the crack of dawn on today of all days. He gave it little thought. There was nothing wrong with reflecting on the past. It was when it was all one thought of to the exclusion of living in the present that one became…

Well, there were a lot of people who were like that. Reborn had met many of them, and it tended towards the pathetic, angry, and bitter sort.

Letters. Status reports. Monthly report to the Ninth needs written and sent out _today_.

Stationary, pens—forget being respected on sight instead of laughed at, forget being able to walk to the corner store after a late night job, and celebrate one day being able to write a letter with a neat hand without having to go about it infuriatingly slowly. He had been doing this for how many years now? And he still had never figured out an effective way to hold a pen.

Of course, being able to write properly would also destroy his excuse for never learning kanji stroke order.

Still. Worth it, for being able to get through an entire letter in one try, without smearing the ink with his hand or tearing the page from pressing too hard. And hey, there that one goes with a massive streak of ink that made the opening line incomprehensible. He set the page alight with a spark from the replica pacifier and tossed it away into the trashcan.

 _"In the months since the Representative Battle, Tsuna's progress is stagnating. With the exception of his Lightning Guardian, the same can be said of his other Guardians; they run through the paces, but they have repeatedly shown that their greatest growth comes in the face of a challenge. I take personal responsibility for failing to realize this earlier._

 _"However, it should be noted; while Tsuna's abilities are the same, his attitude has improved, and given incentive may be more likely to accept his position if asked again. With no prompting he selected his second Mist Guardian after Mukuro Rokudo left Japan. By his own initiative he aided the former Arcobaleno Skull in finding the Carcassa's traitor. With minimal interference on my part, he came to a decision to support the Shimon Famiglia's growth, rather than trying to avoid the problem as he would have done not too long ago._

 _"Little has changed in the Guardians since the last letter; however, Kyoko Sasagawa may prove a valuable asset after all, currently being trained by Ryohei Sasagawa in boxing with vast progress in a matter of weeks, in both physical ability and the strength of her Dying Will. While she does not have the temperament to be a front line combatant, she may be suitable as Japanese associate of the family._

 _"Regarding the questions in your last letter: although I am loath to allow my student to miss class, his teachers have been persuaded to reduce the workload. I will ensure that Tsuna's grades do not suffer as a result of the trip._

 _"Lastly, there have been some developments with the Lightning Guardian…"_

Reborn finished up the last few paragraphs, signed a flourished 'R', and Leon crawled across the page from where he had been resting in the sunlight, leaving several inky footprints. The letter was sealed and in the mail within an hour.

 _Lancia_

"Forgive me father, for I have sinned. It has been five years since I last confessed."

No matter how many times he approached a house, he could never escape the sensation of a weight pressing on his chest. He removed his hands from his pockets, adjusted his tie, and knocked on the door.

A man came to the door. He was gray of hair, but looked young. When he spoke, there was a rough edge on his voice, like he used to be a smoker but had given up the habit some time ago. "Hello? Can I help you?" he said.

"Hello, sir, I'm sorry to bother you, but I'm looking for Samuel Aaron and was told he was at this address?" It was formula, at this point.

"Aye, that's me. Can I ask who you are?"

"My name is Lancia." There was still something in his heart that soared whenever he was able to speak his true name. "I hoped I might be able to speak to you on a matter regarding your brother, Oz."

Some, at the mention of their late friend, their son or daughter, their brother or sister, their father or mother, became hostile. Some quietly asked him to leave. Samuel sighed heavily. He checked his watch. "Please, come inside."

"I don't know if I should, sir. You may not be pleased to have me inside, once I've told you what I have to say," Lancia said carefully.

Samuel narrowed his eyes at Lancia. "Let me get some shoes on, we can talk out here on the porch."

When Samuel returned, he had a knife concealed beneath his jacket, but Lancia drew no attention to it.

"Mr. Aaron, what I have to tell you is in some ways beyond belief, but I swear that every word is true. Approximately five years ago, I worked for an organization as a bodyguard…"

* * *

When Lancia finished, Samuel had his face in his hands.

"I've been travelling Italy this past year, finding the friends and relations of those victims, trying to make amends for what I did. I am beyond salvation, but if I didn't do anything and everything I could for the people I hurt, then I wouldn't be able to rest in peace. If there is anything I can do for you, it will be done. If you wish me dead, then know that when all is said and done, I will have nothing left to live for in this world. But until then, I cannot rest, I cannot stop."

Samuel's shoulders shook. "He had a fiancé. Kind and beautiful. She's married another man since, but she's kept in touch and has told me how she misses him. And I…god, I miss him. Tell me, please, how did my brother die?"

Lancia knew what he meant by that. "The memories are foggy, and in some places completely dark, but I remember him. When I broke in the door, he stood in the hallway with a gun, trying to hold me off, yelling for the others to get out."

"Died a hero, then? And ain't that the most I can ask for?" He wiped his eyes. "Shit. I'm not gonna ask you to die, because that won't bring him back. And from the sounds of it, you weren't doing it of your own will, and I've heard of far worse things being done by people who were far more aware of it and being forgiven. But that doesn't make it hurt any less." He breathed deeply. "Lancia—you look like a strong one. You said you'd do what I asked of you? Come with me, there's work to be done."

That was how Lancia, the Strongest Man in Northern Italy, found himself on the roof of a community synagogue, helping to repair the roof after a heavy storm the month before. It was a hot day in early fall, and the work was difficult and back-breaking. The sweat ran down his brow, soaking him to his skin. His jacket was long since abandoned, set on the back of a chair inside the building, and the sleeves of his dress shirt were pushed up to his elbows, but he had refused an offer to borrow a work shirt.

Samuel was setting a window into place as he talked to the Rabbi Blum down below. Lancia shut his ears. He set another clay tile into place, and nailed it down with an easy swing.

"Sir? Would you like some water?" said the rabbi's son, a boy no older than fourteen. He had several water bottles under his arm as he skittered across the rooftop to the men of the congregation at work.

"Thank you," Lancia said, and took it gratefully. "Be careful, some of the tiles are slick."

The boy nodded, and went on to the next man.

Lancia sat on the roof for a moment to drink his water, keeping his hammer, nails, and box of tiles in place with one hand. He took a long drink. _Long day that isn't over yet._ He took a look at his watch, and did a double take. _Today's date…wouldn't have even realized it. But yeah, I'm pretty sure, it was one year ago to the day that I was reborn. That kid…I still haven't repaid him in full. But, I don't know if I ever could._

One of the workers yelled out, and a shriek cut through the air. Lancia whipped his head around, and the rabbi's son was spinning his arms trying to keep from falling off the edge of the roof. Lancia leaped up, and the boy fell backwards. He lunged off the roof, grabbed the kid in his arms in midair, and landed hard on the ground thirty feet below.

"David!" Rabbi Blum came up just as Lancia was letting the kid, shaken but unharmed, out of his arms. "Oh, you're okay, thank goodness!" He wrapped his arms around his son. He looked up at Lancia with a light in his eyes. "Thank you, sir, for saving my son."

"Mm. Think nothing of it."

Rabbi Blum released his son to the boy's mother, and faced Lancia eye-to-eye. "Samuel told me what kind of man you are. I hope you are able to find something of peace in the future, Lancia."

"Thank you, Rabbi. I should get back to work."

* * *

"It has been two weeks since I last confessed."

"Speak, my son."

* * *

 _A/N: Have a good week, everyone. Next time, the Tenth Family's First Visit to Italy? The Cavallone Family Halloween Party Arc Begins with Target 10: Poker and Jack._


	10. Poker and Jack

_A/N: Here comes a long chapter that I really enjoyed writing, and I hope you enjoy reading. And because I detest having complicated events occurring without any idea what's going on, here are the basic rules to Hold 'Em Poker as is played in this chapter. If you already have an idea of it, then skip the rest of the author's note. I like to think I made it fairly clear what was happening even if you have only a passing knowledge of poker, but I may have used some jargon that went undefined._

 _One variation of poker is Hold 'Em, also called Texas Hold 'Em. Each player is dealt two cards, and five community cards are put onto the table. The idea is to have the best five-card hand out of the seven cards available to you. After the first deal is a round of betting, then three community cards are turned over in what's called the 'flop'. There's another round of betting, then the fourth card is turned over, a third round of betting, and the last card is turned over; there is a fourth round of betting, and hands are revealed. Whoever has the best hand wins the pot, and you go as many hands as it takes until only one person still has money or tokens left._

 _On your turn during a betting round, you can either: pass, where you choose to skip your turn and come back after everyone else has taken a turn; set the bet, if you're the first person to place a bet; call, which means to match the highest bet thus far; raise, which means to match the minimum bet and increase it; or fold, ducking out of the round and giving up the opportunity to win the round, but also avoiding having to put in a bet if you have a bad hand. Alternatively, if you have a bad hand, you could try bluffing, usually by putting in a large bet that implies that you are very confident about your hand, trying to get the others to fold. If everyone else folds, you win the hand regardless of what your cards were._

 **Target 10: Poker and Jack**

Another day, another session of getting attacked by Hibari for herding in front of the school. For once, Tsuna nearly looked forward to doing his homework, because it meant sitting down.

Before he walked into the house, he checked the mailbox and found at the bottom two letters with the addresses in identical handwriting; one addressed to himself, and the other addressed to Lambo. He turned over the one addressed to him, and squinted at the insignia imprinted in wax. "A 'C'…and two horses, from the Cavallone? Weird, Dino's never sent a letter before. And why would there be one for Lambo? Ugh, I've got a bad feeling about this…"

He pulled open the seal on his letter, and groaned when he realized that it was written in Italian. "Uh…wait. That's…Halloween? Invited to…costume…you've got to be kidding me. Reborn!" he called out as he stepped inside. "He's got something to do with this—Reborn!"

He stumbled up the stairs, plowed into his room, and held up the invitation. Reborn set down his coffee cup and looked up attentively as though he hadn't just been plotting. Tsuna shrugged his backpack off and said "What is this? I see something about a Halloween Party, and Dino's Family's emblem sealed it."

"The Cavallone Family Annual Halloween Gala."

"Annual? I've never heard of it before. And you'd take any excuse to drag me into something weird…"

"Two years ago you had not yet met Dino," Reborn said matter-of-factly. "And last year's was canceled, as it is held in the middle of the month and Dino was busy."

"The Ring Conflict," Tsuna muttered. "I guess that makes sense, but—wait, middle of the month? When exactly…" He scanned the letter, only to have it snatched out of his hand by Reborn.

"The Cavallone Organization's Halloween Gala, taking place the night of October 9th at the Salida Villa in the town of Veruda," Reborn read off. "Just outside Palermo."

At that, Tsuna held up a finger in triumph. "Palermo? That's in Italy, right? Well it looks like I can't go, since I don't have a passport," he said. Reborn produced a Japanese passport, complete with a photo of Tsuna from his last school picture day. Tsuna instantly deflated. "Of course…"

"Next objection?"

"I'll miss school. The ninth is a Thursday, yeah? And it's twelve hours to Sicily from Namida International. I'll miss at least two days of school."

"Five, actually. The Ninth Boss insisted that if you were to be in Italy anyways, that the time should be taken advantage of. Your flight leaves Japan on the eighth, and returns early in the morning on the sixteenth."

"The sixteenth? I'll be spending my birthday in Italy?! No way! You're not going to convince my mom to do it, especially after missing it last year because of the Ring Conflict!" And that just brought forward memories of the year before _that_ , where he'd spent his birthday in the hospital after a magic trick gone awry.

"It's fortunate then that she's already given her approval. She agrees that it's important for a young man to explore world cultures, and it would be a shame to give up this opportunity."

Tsuna's eye twitched. "So this has been in the works for a while now and I only just found out now. Of course…" _I guess I should be glad I know two weeks in advance. Knowing him, he would have put me on the plane while I was still sleeping. Good thing Dino sent the invitations…although, now that I think about it._ "So, my friends are going too? There was another invitation, at least I'm assuming that's what it is, but this one is addressed to Lambo."

"I was against the cow-brat coming, but the Ninth insisted. All of your Guardians have been invited. For you, it's mandatory."

"Of course it is." Tsuna sighed. _Well, Gokudera's guaranteed to come if I'm going. But Ryohei probably wouldn't want to leave Kyoko behind, and from the sounds of it, it's Guardians and Guardians only. Baseball season is over, so Yamamoto might come._ He picked up the invitation from where Reborn had left it. _Eh, it's not like there was going to be anything special for my birthday, anyways. And from what I've seen of Palermo, it looks like a nice city. Here I am convincing myself it's okay because there's no choice in the matter._

A realization hit him in the head like a brick. "Hey, Reborn, here's an idea—an offer. For the week that we're in Italy, I won't whine, I'll wear whatever stupid costume you want, I'll be the perfect little heir."

That caught Reborn's attention, and he turned to look at Tsuna.

"And in exchange, you set up a meeting between me and Aria of Giglio Nero."

"Aria? That may be more difficult that you're imagining. The Giglio Nero Family is not an ally of Vongola due to differences in policy. The Ninth might insist on an armed escort for such a meeting, and Aria isn't the type of person to appreciate that kind of presence."

"And! The entire night of the party, I'll keep Lambo away from you at all times. You won't even know he's there."

"Done." Leon turned into a cell phone, and Reborn started making calls.

Before starting in on his homework, Tsuna checked the lockbox he had stored behind the air vent in his closet. Still shut tight. _That'll be one promise taken care of._

* * *

Tsuna had somewhat underestimated how much his friends would be into the idea of going to Italy for a week; every one of his Guardians confirmed that they would be coming, even to his horror and shock Hibari—although the fact that he might get to fight Dino again might have been a contributing factor. Yamamoto, Chrome, and Ryohei had not had passports yet, but before a week was up each of them got one in the mail.

"So I don't know if Reborn's just being secretive as ever, or if he really doesn't know what the Ninth has planned for the week," Tsuna said, as he walked beside Yamamoto and Gokudera to school on October 7th. "But all I know for sure is that there's Dino's party the one night, and apparently I'll be spending the day beforehand getting to know the city. Otherwise, I don't have a clue."

"Hey, I bet we can find something fun to do. Gokudera, you used to live in Italy, you know anything fun to do?" Yamamoto said.

Gokudera made a face like he was sick. "Uh, well, actually…I wasn't in Palermo for long. I'm so sorry, Tenth, I'll spend every minute between now and landing studying every piece of information I can about the city!"

"That's okay, you don't have to do that. You'll be helpful enough, since the only other one of us that knows Italian is Chrome, and Lambo I guess."

Yamamoto laughed as he put an arm around Tsuna's shoulders. "I guess you didn't get a word of that lesson Gokudera tried to give either. Fail buddies now and forever, eh?"

"Mm. Oh, that reminds me, we have a test today, don't we?" Tsuna shivered at the thought. _I really was going to study yesterday, but then everybody showed up at my house and we got caught up in costume ideas. Well…man, this is different. Am I actually looking forward to spending a week with my friends, even if it is in Italy? How bad could it be, after all?_

* * *

Very bad, as it turned out, and that was within a minute of takeoff on the tiny private jet owned by the Vongola. Tsuna had done his fair share of flying, and he figured that being in a plane wouldn't be much different from that. He was very, very wrong. It took about a half an hour for Tsuna to stop gripping the armrests so hard his knuckles were white. It had taken nearly two hours thereafter for him to stop thinking over and over again about the fact that he was in a tiny metal tube over 40,000 feet up in the air, and everyone around him was treating this as an entirely Normal Thing, totally not worth panicking about.

At some point, he slept for about four hours, woke up to Lambo bouncing up and down on his chest, and was ordered to come play hold 'em poker to make it a six-person game—Hibari had been sleeping the entire trip with headphones on, and Ryohei was by his own admission a horrific poker player.

"I've played poker once, once, and I was terrible at it," Tsuna muttered, as Gokudera dealt out onto the table. He was sitting with his left side to the window, Tsuna was across from him, Reborn sat on the table to Tsuna's left, Yamamoto sat on a seat across the aisle, Chrome to his left, and Lambo sat next to Gokudera, and from the moment that the cards were dealt Lambo was trying to peek at Gokudera's cards, and in trying to keep his cards out of sight Gokudera knocked over the pile of wrapped candies that they were using as tokens. Gokudera grumbled as he pushed his tokens back into a neat pile.

Tsuna sighed at his nine and jack of hearts, and put in two candies. Reborn raised it to three, Yamamoto and Chrome called it, and Lambo went all-in.

"Stupid cow! Don't you know how to play this game, you're the one who was begging to play!"

Tsuna and Yamamoto shushed him simultaneously, but Hibari did not seem to have been woken up by the yelling. Lambo got ejected from the game by a vote, and Gokudera re-dealt. Tsuna put in three candies, and everyone called it. Gokudera turned over three cards, an ace of hearts, a three of hearts, and a jack of spades. Tsuna considered his twos of diamonds and spades, and put in two candies. Reborn raised it to five, Yamamoto and Gokudera called it, and both Chrome and Tsuna folded. The next card was turned over, and Reborn put in another eight. Gokudera and Yamamoto both folded, and Reborn showed his cards.

"A pair of jacks," Tsuna said, deflated. It was better than junk, and better than the pair of twos that Tsuna had, but that was about it. "I forgot that we're playing with the biggest liar in the criminal underworld." Reborn only smirked at the easy bluff. Tsuna grabbed up the deck, clumsily shuffled it, and dealt next.

The next hand went to Gokudera with an easy straight after calling Yamamoto's bluff on junk. After that Chrome took a hand with a full house, and another with a bald-faced bluff; for all she had become a much happier and more open person in recent months, she was still excellent at keeping her emotions hidden when the situation called for it. On the fifth hand, Tsuna folded again after the flop was put down, and got smacked in the face with a Leon-Flyswatter.

"You've folded on every hand; you're in third place from not ever taking a chance," Reborn said.

"Yeah and the best I've had is junk or a single pair." Tsuna held up the cards he had had, which combined with the cards on the table made a single pair of fours. He perked up dramatically, put a hand to his ear as though to hear something far off, and said "Oh, what's this? It's the ghost of my home tutor, telling me that I shouldn't take on battles that I have no chance in." And somewhere around the word 'ghost' was the line that he crossed, and Reborn grabbed the offending hand and easily twisted it around to Tsuna's back at an uncomfortable angle. "Ow-ow-ow I give I give!"

"I expect effort and respect as deserved, no less than ever," Reborn said, as he released Tsuna's arm, and went back to the game.

Tsuna ground his teeth together, and on the next hand he gave an exaggerated sigh but called a ten-piece bet that Gokudera put in, and came up with two pairs and the win. The hand thereafter Chrome took, and cleaned out Yamamoto with it. Reborn got a flush and took over half of Tsuna's pot and wiped out Gokudera, while Chrome folded and lost little. Chrome moved over to sit next to Gokudera, and Reborn sat at the end of the table.

The next deal was Reborn's. Tsuna checked his cards, and hid his disappointment at junk. He thought about folding, consequences be damned, until he felt someone's foot tap his under the table. He looked up, and Chrome was very pointedly staring away from him and at her cards as she apparently thought about her bet.

Chrome put in five pieces, Tsuna and Reborn both called. Three cards on the table, Chrome put in another five, Tsuna called, and nervously tapped the table with his fingertips. Reborn raised to ten. Tsuna carefully met Chrome's gaze, and just barely perceptibly shook his head. Chrome met Reborn's bet, as did Tsuna.

Fourth card, Chrome put in fifteen from the start, and Tsuna called it, leaving him with three pieces of candy. Reborn called as well, and the fifth card came up. Tsuna passed, and Reborn bet ten. Chrome pursed her lips, and Tsuna kept tapping his fingers. She raised to fifteen. Tsuna folded, and prepared himself to get smacked again, but it never came.

"Nineteen," Reborn said, as that was exactly how much he had to bet with. Chrome called it, and Tsuna nearly broke out laughing when they each revealed their cards; Chrome had three of a kind, Reborn had been dead bluffing with junk.

"I don't think I stand a chance, at this point," Tsuna said, throwing his last three pieces of candy into Chrome's pile.

"Bah, it was beginner's luck," Gokudera grumbled. "It was a game of luck, Tenth, if it were a game of skill you would certainly win!"

"No, I think by the rules of the game that he was playing, he won," Chrome said, as she started splitting the candies up into eight even piles. "Thanks, boss."

Gokudera blinked. "Wait…what?"

"They were in cahoots," Reborn said, but it was in good humor.

Yamamoto leaned in. "Ah, that was what Tsuna was doing. You know how the kid lies, and signaled Chrome when he was bluffing, right?"

"Something like that," Tsuna said, as he picked up a piece of candy. He set a hand on the table as the plane rumbled over turbulence.

"So, you were actually paying attention. Most professionals would be ashamed to see the kinds of tells that I was playing," Reborn said.

"Hm? Oh, like how you kept adjusting your hat when you were bluffing?" Tsuna said. "I assumed you were doing a fake tell to throw off guesses. Same as playing with your sideburns. It was…too obvious? What, you made fake tells when you were actually bluffing as a hint?"

Gokudera frowned. "So, how'd you know he was bluffing, then?"

Tsuna thought about it. "That is…Chrome, how did you describe it? Like a spider-web?"

She went red at having the attention pulled to her. "Sort of…a thinly-distributed flame, projected from his ring, that when disturbed by the sudden activity of another flame in the vicinity, is bounced back as feedback. Like when an insect touches a spider-web, the spider can tell because of the vibrations of its prey struggling to escape."

"…I'd forgotten the second half of that analogy," Tsuna said, turning a little green at the idea of being compared to a hunting spider. "But, it's not perfect, yet? Like I can kinda tell if somebody's lying because their heart rate speeds up and their flame flares more frequently in response, but that's about it."

"And here I thought all those secret meetings with Chrome were for something inappropriate," Reborn said, smiling from beneath the brim of his hat. Chrome turned bright red, Tsuna fell over in his seat, Yamamoto started choking on his juice, Gokudera paled, Ryohei started yelling about things that were to the extreme not appropriate, Hibari woke up and smacked half of them in the head with his tonfas, and Lambo stole half the candy for himself.

* * *

The trip from Haneda International in Tokyo to Falcone-Borsellino Airport in Palermo, Sicily was a flight of about fourteen hours. The flight had taken off at 10 AM local time, which would suggest that it should have been around midnight when they landed. Despite this, even by the time they were through customs, the sun was still high in the sky.

It was 5:30 PM Local Time, when it was 12:30 AM in Namimori, seven hours ahead. First, this made for an interesting phone call to his mother upon landing, who spoke shortly as I-Pin and Fuuta were asleep. Second, this made dinner with the Ninth that first night unavoidable. And it was probably going to be a disaster, since Tsuna was barely awake enough to unzip the backpack he had carried on with his formal suit.

He managed it, somehow, and carefully got changed into his suit in the airport bathroom. It was the same suit that he had worn during Choice, in the other future, which just made it feel _weird_. The last time he had been dressed so formally, it was to echo the uniforms worn by the First Generation Vongola when they went to battle—not for power as Mafiosi, but to protect the people as vigilantes. And now, he was going to have pasta, probably, with Vongola Nono and his Guardians. _Real heroic,_ he thought, as he checked himself in the mirror.

He was the fourth to get done changing—Gokudera had plenty of experience getting into formal suits, Tsuna had helped Lambo before getting changed himself, and Chrome hadn't had to jostle for space in the women's restroom.

Tsuna noted with some interest that both Reborn and Hibari had vanished, although he wasn't too concerned. Hibari could take care of himself, while Reborn probably had business to take care of, and it wasn't like he was a babysitter. Supposedly there was a driver waiting outside the international terminal that would take them to dinner, and from there they could figure it out.

He tilted his head at both Chrome and Gokudera. Gokudera wore his Vongola Gear as usual, but it kind of stuck out like a sore thumb in the formal clothing. Meanwhile, while Chrome's Vongola Gear was small enough to go unnoticed, she was also wearing her favored knee-high boots with skull pins on each side. It was her own style and she did it well—there was a reason why she specifically took the last name 'Dokuro', which was homophonous with the Japanese word for 'Skull'—but it still stood out.

Gokudera caught Tsuna's gaze, and upon realizing what he was looking at immediately started fumbling at his belt buckle. "I'm so sorry, Tenth, I'm just used to always keeping it on my person—Dokuro, take those skull pins off, they're not proper."

"No, no, you really don't have to, either of you!" Tsuna said quickly, and to make his point he pulled the Sky Ring from his pocket and slipped both rings on. "I just—actually—I was just thinking about how it's weird to be wearing these clothes when it's just dinner. But you know I hate all this stuff." He tried to keep it vague, even if it was really minimally necessary—it helped that they were speaking in Japanese, and the terminal was sufficiently busy that nobody paid any mind to a few teenagers that were probably on a school trip. "It's actually kinda neat. Like…micro-aggressions is the wrong word, but it's big enough to be noticed, small enough that anyone that did notice might not feel comfortable saying anything. In fact, I just got an idea." He pulled off the knotted cufflinks that he had received with the suit, dropped them into his backpack, and reached far into it to get a tiny plastic bag with a pair of metal cufflinks. "My mom got me these after she saw the suit."

He carefully pinned the cartoony tuna fish-shaped cufflinks into place, and crossed his arms confidently over his chest.

Gokudera seemed painfully torn between wanting to yell out "Fight the power!" and the fact that he would look a little ridiculous doing so. He settled on "Alright, Tenth! We'll show those old men who's really in charge!"

The idea made Tsuna's stomach sink into the floor. _Wait no I just wanted to be passive-aggressive—_

The last two came out simultaneously, and neither Ryohei nor Yamamoto had their ties on, and Ryohei's shirt wasn't tucked in at all. Yamamoto was smiling, but not in the normal way, more like he was so tired he did not know where he was way—he was the only person not to fall asleep at some point on the flight and had gotten little sleep the night before.

Gokudera groaned and grabbed Yamamoto's tie out of his hands. He tied it loosely around his own neck, then handed it back so that Yamamoto could set it under his collar and pull it tight. "Thanks, I'm still no good at this."

Tsuna sighed as he picked up Lambo, who was napping away. At least he wasn't running around the terminal bothering people. He started walking as Gokudera argued with Ryohei about his tie, but the older boy insisted that it made him feel like he was choking.

On the far end of the international terminal, there was an older man in a driver's uniform complete with cap, holding a small dry-erase board that had 'Sawada' written first in smooth Latin lettering, then in precise hiragana beneath it. The driver was unmistakably Italian of features, but he spoke Japanese easily when Tsuna approached him.

The driver's eyes went to the ring Tsuna wore before he spoke. "Mr. Sawada? A pleasure to make your acquaintance at last," he said. Gokudera stepped up beside Tsuna and raised an eyebrow without a word. "Of course, sir." The driver held out his hand to indicate a ring he wore on his middle finger, inscribed with a simplified Vongola Family Emblem. Gokudera tapped the surface with one finger, and seemed satisfied. The driver nodded and said "If you'll follow me, please, your luggage will be taken care of separately."

"Your Japanese is very good," was all Tsuna could think of to say.

"Thank you, Boss." Just outside the building, the driver opened the back door of a waiting nondescript black car with six seats in the back, three facing forward and three facing backwards. Gokudera stopped Tsuna before he could step inside, and walked around the car occasionally tapping on the engine cover or kneeling down to look inside the wheel wells. It took a minute for Tsuna to realize that he was checking the car for bombs. He felt sick at the very idea of it. _Well, I guess that's the good thing about Gokudera working with explosives for so long—he won't miss if there is one._

Gokudera slid into the shotgun seat, and everybody else piled in. Tsuna sat down with Lambo on his lap. As the driver checked his mirrors, Tsuna said "I didn't catch your name."

"Few care to know it, but if it please you, call me Jack, boss."

"So, do you know where we're having dinner, Jack?"

"The _Entrare_ , it is called." Tsuna could see the smile on Jack's face in the rear-view mirror. "It servers mainly traditional Italian cuisine for a high class crowd."

"Oh?" Yamamoto said, perking up. "Well, count me out, class isn't exactly my strong suit."

"He admits it!" Gokudera yelled out in disbelief.

"So, Jack, um," Tsuna said, trying to think of another question to ask. Anything to avoid either fighting, or awkward silence. "You must drive a lot of important people. Hear anything interesting lately?"

"Rumors and gossip, boss."

"What kind of rumors?"

Jack hesitated before continuing, but seemed to understand that Tsuna wasn't trying to bait him into saying something unseemly. "Well…the Don has apparently been healthier than usual, lately. The Don's son, the vicious one you know? He's making some waves, but I can't give many specifics."

"So you know nothing, essentially," Gokudera said, and nearly spat before remembering where he was.

"Oh, don't misunderstand me, I do it out of loyalty; I am a driver, yes, but I was originally scouted for the Varia."

There was a long moment of pause as they registered that information, then Gokudera leaped right back in with "Now hold on! Your loyalty is to the Tenth Boss!"

"Gokudera, stop it! I can understand not wanting to talk about Xanxus in too much detail, he probably blows people's heads off for less!"

"Well not really, the most he ever does to his own subordinates is loud threats and throwing shot glasses at them occasionally. Bad for morale if you kill everyone."

 _Oh, god, that casual attitude toward murder, he's Varia alright._

"But you seemed a bit surprised to learn that I was Varia. Wouldn't expect it, eh? To be fair, I haven't taken a job in a decade, since I drove me and three other guys out of a job gone bad on gasoline vapors." He laughed at the memory. "But believe me, boss, I make it my personal policy that I will not allow any harm to come to my passengers, whether it be the Don or a servant, and never once have I been so much as late." He paused to merge onto E90 going east.

"What officer did you work under, during your time with the Varia?" Yamamoto asked lazily.

"I worked under the Mist Officer, Mammon, though I'm no spellcaster myself. They thought I had something of precognition, but if there's anything up there," and he tapped the side of his head for emphasis "It's only about the road."

Gokudera's eyes lit up. "You mean like a routewitch?"

"A _what_?"

Gokudera launched into a rapid explanation of a type of individual said to roam the byways of the world. Tsuna didn't really get it, and he drifted into his own thoughts for a while.

"Eyes up, boss," Jack sat, ten minutes later. "We're gonna be in the middle of the city in a few minutes here."

"Alright, everyone—not you, Tenth, you'll be amazing as always—pay attention." Gokudera didn't even bother to turn around as he addressed the other Guardians. "I was looking up this restaurant, and it's right on the water. If a situation comes up, we run it the same as back in Choice. Yamamoto on point, I'll be on defense. Lawn-Head has the best mobility, he'll be supporting you. Dokuro, we'll be depending on you to keep the Tenth out of sight of any possible enemies."

"Now hold on!" Tsuna said loudly. "I'm not going to sit and hide!" He coughed. "And besides, who says anything's going to happen?"

Gokudera bit back a retort, but Jack just about read his mind and spoke up. "Boss, you're in the heartland of the Sicilian Mafia. Your visit's been kept pretty tight under wraps, because every two-bit gang-banger imagines cutting off the head of the Vongola—figuratively speaking, a Decapitation Order is a plan that involves assassinating a family's leadership—and some might just be crazy enough to try it."

"Exactly, and as your right hand it is my responsibility to ensure that doesn't happen!"

Jack made a buzzer noise with his mouth. "Wrong. That's the head of security."

"Oi, piss off old man, this doesn't concern you!"

Jack continued on as though Gokudera hadn't interrupted him. "The boss says to his right hand 'I don't want to die at this meeting'. The right hand says to the head of security 'you ensure the boss's security at this event.' And the head of security organizes everything to ensure that the meeting goes off without a hitch."

"But I don't have a head of security," Tsuna said. _I can't believe I'm getting into this._ "Or—no, wait, I guess, Gokudera would be, since he's the only one of us that knows anything about how all this works." _Checking the driver's ring for his identity, checking the car for bombs…_

"Which works, but that just means he's got two different hats," Jack said. "One as the right hand, one as the head of security. It isn't the right hand's responsibility to ensure security. Anyways, I think the Miss there can attest to the fact that concerns over security will be…minimal."

Gokudera twisted around to look at Chrome. She said quietly "There's a pair of men in the car behind us that I recognize from the Inheritance Ceremony. Kyoya is on a motorcycle a few cars further back."

Gokudera muttered something incomprehensible, and turned back around.

* * *

 _A/N: Not a lot of plot, but it was getting really long. At least what I consider to be really long. Jack was originally just a regular driver working for the Vongola, then I realized that I wanted him to actually have some idea of what kind of situation he was in, so he became an ex-Varia assassin. He's like 50-something, was scouted for the Varia when he was twenty-something, so he's been in this game for a long while._

 _Got a poll up on my profile which may affect this. Essentially, should I have Japanese characters use honorifics even in English, and use speech patterns more like the original Japanese rather than anglicizing it as I have been doing?_


	11. Boss

_A/N: Not much to say besides this is the longest chapter thus far. And I think the quality may be a little better than usual, as I followed a bit of advice and completely retyped a second draft and caught a lot of mistakes and awkward phrasing. I'm not saying it'll be perfect, but better than usual at least mechanically._

 _I'm gonna be totally honest here: I have never studied Italian, the closest I came was high school Spanish which was like four years ago, so any time in the next few chapters where somebody is speaking Italian, I probably got it entirely with google translate. I tried to stick to mostly simple vocabulary and literal phrasing when say Tsuna is speaking Italian or English, but I also tried to keep it...like...entertaining to read. I'm just hand-waving._

 **Target 11: Boss**

Narrow roads made first by horses and wagons, old buildings with their own spark of life, small shops crammed together, stalls with hand-written signs selling fresh fruit out of wooden crates. Tsuna nearly got into a fight with Lambo, who wanted an orange from a stall next to the building that had the _Entrare_ on the third floor—Tsuna would have gotten it for him if he'd had any Euros on his person, but all he had was a 100¥ coin in one of his pockets. Lambo looked so tired that Tsuna considered asking the vendor if they would take the coin as payment anyways.

 _Entrare_ was right on the water. The building was three stories tall and stretched two hundred feet either way along the cobblestone road, but only the third floor was the supposedly high-class restaurant; the second floor looked to be apartments, and the ground floor was split between a café and a bar. The café had already closed, while the bar had yet to open.

"So, that's the Mediterranean?" Tsuna asked, looking out over the water.

"Stupid-Tsuna," Lambo muttered, from his seat in Tsuna's arms. "Palermo's on the north…"

"Ah, that is to say," Gokudera said quickly, "the Mediterranean Sea is on the south side of Sicily; that's the Tyrrhenian Sea on the north side of Sicily."

Jack locked up their bags in the back of the car, with the exception of the drawstring bag that Lambo wore to hold his Vongola Gear. He gave his phone number to Gokudera, and left them on the curb in front of the building.

"I didn't want to say this in front of that guy, he seems to really like Palermo, but," Tsuna said quietly. "It's so… _old._ "

"Oh, man, I'm not the only one," Yamamoto said in relief. He walked beside Tsuna into the building, and to Tsuna's consternation took the stairs two at a time. "It's not what I was picturing at all; I think of Kyoto and Tokyo when I think of cities, not…"

"Well, Palermo _is_ old," Gokudera said. "And it's never been rebuilt from the ground-up. It's got its history, and it's unlikely to be levelled anytime soon. And it'd be just about impossible to convince the locals to change a thing about it. Even the most built-up cities, Milan and Naples, don't have much beyond the immediate downtown, and that's because they took the heaviest bombing during World War II. The only city in Italy anything like Tokyo or Kyoto is Renatti, and that's a much newer city on the mainland." He was practically grinning at the opportunity to show off his knowledge. Yamamoto had stopped listening about halfway through.

At the top landing, Tsuna pushed open the glass door, and nearly pulled a face at the individuals in the restaurant. It was all round tables, with planters hanging from the ceiling and minimal lighting to set the mood. The patrons were about half couples on formal dates, while the other half were all obviously gangsters trying and failing to not look suspicious. Tsuna suddenly felt far less overdressed, as everyone was in there finery. There was a constant buzz of conversation, but it wasn't only in Italian; English, French, Mandarin, and what Tsuna guessed was Hindi all got their representation.

The hostess appeared as though from nowhere to greet them. She said something in rapid Italian, and Gokudera was quick to translate. "Welcome to _Entrare_ , do you have a reservation?"

Tsuna took a deep breath. " _Si,_ ah, _Sawada._ " It was a hope beyond hope, but given that the driver had met them with a sign saying his surname instead of 'Vongola' in big black letters, he figured it was worth a shot.

The hostess nodded and scanned over the list of reservations. She raised an eyebrow, and spoke without raising her head—fortunately, Gokudera only gritted his teeth at what he took as an insult. "She needs to see an ID, Tenth."

"Right, of course." He started digging through his pockets, willing for Gokudera to calm down, and his stomach sank. _Oh, noooo._ "I think I left my passport in my bag. For the love of—wait," he said, as he was suddenly hit by an idea. He asked Gokudera, who only shrugged, uncertain. But as Tsuna raised his right hand to indicate the Sky Ring, Gokudera asked if it would suffice for ID anyways.

The hostess' eyes widened, and she nodded. " _Si, bene, molto bene._ " She indicated for them to follow, and Tsuna shoved his hand back in his pocket. _Crisis averted!_

And then, as they stepped into a private dining room, Tsuna suddenly felt a tension in his stomach that told him to stand up straight and confident. Gokudera caught the change in his posture just in time to stop slouching. Ryohei took Lambo from Tsuna, and Yamamoto put on his best baseball-ace air of confidence.

Sitting at the other end of a long table, accompanied by four people, was a man in a mask with scratched around the mouth that invoked the image of a sun-bleached skull. _Oh that's definitely not the Ninth._ The hostess bowed to the man at the end of the table, and left, closing the door behind her.

The skull-faced man grabbed his mask with a massive hand, and pulled it away. It sparked with a Sky Flame as it revealed his features, a handsome man with curly hair and a military jacket. He spoke Italian with a northern Russian accent. _"Ciao, Vongola. Il mio nome e Alexsandr Giegiov, della Famiglia Giegue._ "

* * *

Alexsandr Giegiov, head of the syndicate that was also called the 'Grave-Diggers', instructed his subordinates to remove their masks. Two looked to be identical twins, and were easier to tell apart with their masks on than off—the first, on Giegiov's left hand, wore a mask with an exaggerated smile, while the other wore a mask decorated with a simplified weeping expression. When they sat next to each other, they invoked the image of the drama masks of comedy and tragedy. On his right hand sat a younger man with short-cut hair, hawkish features, and a similar military jacket to that of his boss. Last was a girl of Korean descent that couldn't have been any older than Chrome and was even more petite, but she carried herself with the same kind of poise as the others did. Each left their mask sitting on their lap.

The original assumption was that Tsuna was going to be put at the Ninth's left hand, with Gokudera on Tsuna's other side, and the rest looping around the table and leaving the far end seat empty (they had expected for Hibari to not join them for dinner).

With a careful nudge, Gokudera directed Tsuna to the head of the table opposite to that of Giegue's. He silently directed Yamamoto to Tsuna's left hand side, and Ryohei and Lambo took the other seat next to Yamamoto's, leaving a gap between them and the youngest of Giegiov's subordinates. Gokudera pulled out a chair for Chrome, and Giegiov stood up while she sat down. Gokudera took the seat on Tsuna's right hand.

All this, while Tsuna clumsily introduced himself in Italian. " _Piacere, Giegue,_ " he said, imitating how he had been referred to by the name 'Vongola'. " _Il mio nome e Tsunayoshi Sawada. Le presento los Tutores mi,_ " he said, that is, "My name is Tsunayoshi Sawada. These are my Guardians…" He gestured to each of them in turn. "Hayato Gokudera, Chrome Dokuro, Takeshi Yamamoto, Ryohei Sasagawa, Lambo."

Alexsandr Giegiov nodded, and smiled pleasantly. _Man, for the head of an assassination syndicate, he seems friendly enough._ He too indicated his companions, and introduced each in turn, although Tsuna was pretty sure it was codenames that he used. The man was called Opera, the twins were called Thalia and Melpomene, and the Korean girl was called Gaksital.

Alexsandr wrapped up his introductions with a long sentence in Italian that Tsuna had absolutely no chance of understanding, and he waited for Gokudera to translate. "And I quote, 'I was told that you had six Guardians, Vongola. Did something happen to the other?'"

"He doesn't like to be in crowds, and while he does help us sometimes, he prefers to be independent. He's probably getting food on his own." _Or picking a fight. Either is fairly likely._

"'And what of your tutor? I cannot deny, I had looked forward to meeting the World's Greatest Hitman.'"

"Who knows?" Tsuna said, but the exaggerated shrug must have made it pretty obvious what he meant, and Alexsandr broke into boisterous laughter at that.

That seemed to mostly break the tension, although they were still mostly only doing small talk, even after they realized that it was faster for both to speak English, as Italian was Giegue's third language much like Tsuna. A waiter appeared with salads that Tsuna could barely stomach, and he mostly just picked around the leafy romaine and ate the iceberg lettuce. The first thing that Gaksital said in the entire meal was to reassure him that her boss hated salad as well.

"I am sorry I could not attend your Inheritance Ceremony a while back," Alexsandr said, as the salad plates were pulled away. "But then, given what happened, perhaps it is for the best that I didn't attend after all."

"I'm sorry about the family that you lost," Tsuna said carefully. _Danger zone, danger zone, prepare for probing questions!_

"People die, people live, it is the way of things." Alexsandr took a sip of his water. "However, I have heard that you have made an ally out of those responsible, the Shimon Decimo and his Guardians?"

"Well, I don't know about that," Tsuna said. "Enma Kozato is my friend, yeah, and they did some bad things—and don't think I'm trying to brush it off, they hurt my friends too. But everything that happened was a result of another person's machinations, taking advantage of the fact that they are morally good people, in the end, just misled."

Alexandr nodded. "I see. I had spoken with the Ninth immediately after those events, but it is a relief to hear it directly from the source. Revenge is always understandable."

Tsuna paused with his glass partway to his mouth. _Revenge, he said. This man Giegiov..isn't the Giegue's place in the alliance not very old? How would they have reacted if the justification for that war became more well-known?_ He knew better than to ask. Instead, he took a deep breath, and said "Can I be honest? While it's interesting to get to know you and yours…"

"You didn't expect to see me sitting in here when you walked in?" Alexsandr raised an eyebrow in amusement. "My apologies for going along with the Nono's deception, Vongola. I just couldn't help but be interested in meeting you, and given how my family's reputation precedes me, I doubt that you would have been eager to meet."

Tsuna nearly started yelling at how convoluted it was.

"But—oh, excellent, the main course. As I was saying, Vongola, even if the Shimon Family has not been formally accepted into the major Alliance of Sicilian families, I still feel it's appropriate to ask: would you have any objections to the Giegue offering a formal alliance with the Shimon Family?"

Tsuna had just taken the first bite of the fish over pasta dinner, and started halfway choking on it. Yamamoto thumped him on the back, and he coughed. "Ack—I, I mean, like, what do you mean?"

"An economic alliance, most likely, although I'm sure the terms would be debated further. I've heard fascinating things about the work they are getting involved in, and I admit that I was amazed when Shimon Decimo paid the reparations as demanded. They are a rising power in this world, and I want to ensure my family's place. Surely, you must understand that, Vongola?"

 _Not not really actually, my concerns up to this point have been fighting tooth and nail to keep my friends and loved ones_ alive, _forget status or money._ "Look, make your offer to them. I trust Enma—I mean, Shimon Decimo to make the right choice of whether or not to accept the offer."

Alexsandr nodded. "Thank you, Vongola. You're quite a breath of fresh air compared to your predecessor; speaking frankly instead of dodging around the subject and playing word games."

 _He's not my predecessor because I'm not going to—oh, forget it._ "I'm not nearly smart enough to play word games." When all else fails, make self-deprecating remarks.

The meal passed from then on in relative silence, no doubt helped by the fact that Lambo slept through the entire thing. The man called Opera made a comment about it as the dinner plates were being taken away. "I suppose the downside of selecting a child as one of your officers."

"Whatever he does, I'd say it's worth it when he brings down a bolt of lightning in the middle of a battle," Tsuna said defensively. "And at any rate, he usually doesn't sleep through meals, he's just jet-lagged. It's…just past 3 AM in Japan."

Thalia broke out laughing. "No wonder your Rain Guardian looks like he's about to pass out. For god's sake, Alexsandr, cut this short before you get in trouble for letting the Vongola's heir get hurt for lack of sleep."

"Vongola? Do you have any issue with skipping coffee and dessert?" Alexsandr said, raising an eyebrow at Tsuna.

As much as Tsuna wanted to say yes, he said "Really, it's fine."

Alexsandr took a look at his own vintage pocketwatch. "Let's say that it was for my sake; my wife is expecting me back by 8:30, hm?"

Tsuna felt a giant weight lift off his shoulders. "Sure, that sounds fine, Giegue. It was good to meet you." He stood, said a word to Gokudera to confirm that the bill was footed by Vongola—it was—and Alexsandr approached him with an outstretched hand. A ring bearing an opaline stone was on the middle finger of his left hand, with a wedding band on the finger next to it.

"I look forward to doing business again in the future, Vongola," Alexsandr said as he shook Tsuna's hand.

"Same to you," Tsuna said to be polite.

Alexsandr and his officers each replaced their masks, and left the room in a silent procession.

"Still scary guys," Gokudera said, laughing nervously.

"No kidding."

The car was waiting for them when they left the building. Hibari was trying to bait Jack into fighting him, but the moment the other Guardians appeared he was back on his motorcycle and away, his gakuran fluttering like a cape behind him.

Tsuna only barely kept himself awake on the way to their lodgings—a hotel with a humble exterior that bore a Cavallone Family emblem inscribed into the bottom right hand corner of the sign. Tsuna got his key using his passport as an ID, trudged upstairs to the single room, and stayed awake just long enough to pull off his shoes and jacket before falling asleep. He dreamed of skeletons making wisecracks and eating raw fish.

* * *

Ryohei was the first one awake by a long shot the next morning. It was only six, but he had gotten a full eight hours of sleep, and he needed his morning run anyways to stay in top shape. Sometime between when he left the hotel for his run, and when he was pounding his fist on the door to room 207 yelling "Wake up Sawada!" at 7 AM, he had obtained a plastic shopping bag full of fresh oranges.

When bleary-eyed Tsuna opened the door, Ryohei grunted at the sight of him still in mostly the same clothes as he had been wearing the night before. He grabbed an orange out of the bag and shoved it in Tsuna's face.

Tsuna took it and blinked. "Why do you have so many oranges?" There were still well over a dozen in the bag.

Ryohei crossed his arms over his chest. "There was a stand down the way selling 'em. Was only gonna get a dozen, then I chased off some delinquents that were harassing the woman running it. She gave me twice what I paid for, but I put a little more on her chair when she wasn't looking," he said, and grinned.

Tsuna cracked a smile at that. "That's just the kind of man you are, right?"

"To the extreme!" he shouted, pumping his fist. He put another orange into Tsuna's hand, and went on to room 208 where Chrome had a single to herself.

Tsuna shut the door, turned on the light, and set down both oranges on the bedside table in order to dig out his clothes. His suitcase had been taken up to the room for him by a courier, but he had packed it haphazardly, and it nearly exploded when he opened it up. "Let's see…wonder if I could get away with casual today? Although I certainly won't be wearing that suit again anytime soon. Ooh…" He grabbed a shirt from the bottom of his suitcase with his '27' printed on the back. "That should do."

He had just pulled on the shirt and a pair of jeans and was checking himself in the mirror when a certain somebody walked into his room uninvited and said "So how did dinner go?"

"Amazingly enough, I didn't ignite a gang war in the middle of Palermo. I _did_ almost pass out when I saw who we were meeting. Thanks for that, by the way."

"I had no idea the Ninth was planning that," Reborn said, as he leaped up onto Tsuna's bed and picked up one of the oranges. "Especially not with the Giegue Family."

 _…And here I thought Reborn definitely set me up for disaster._ "Sorry. I just assumed. Well, they're nicer than the Varia."

"Don't get complacent. The Giegue is dangerous and vicious as a whole. Thalia and Melpomene are the heads of the assassination cell; Thalia excels in the use of the family's trademark chain-scythe, while Melpomene's knowledge of explosives outstrips Gokudera's. The young girl, Gaksital, is a master sniper who specializes in the use of an anti-material rifle at all ranges."

"Okay, okay, I get it. Don't cross the Giegue Family." _Like I had any plans to, they're still mafia._ "What are you doing here, then, making sure the Ninth doesn't pull another fast one?"

"Hardly, you're meeting Aria today, remember? I have my own business to discuss with her."

"You certainly didn't mention that! Agh, where's that box?" He threw half of his luggage onto the bed to look for the lockbox—the key had been hanging on a chain around his neck for a week. "Oh, man, I forgot to mention it to everyone, but it might look a little weird to bring them with me to a meeting like this…" He still remembered what Reborn had said about how the Giglio Nero was not a part of the alliance that had Vongola at the forefront of its leadership.

"They'll be busy, anyways. Lal Mirch is evaluating their abilities on behalf of the CEDEF."

He shuddered at the very thought of it. "Right. Ugh, give me a second to get my gear and check on everyone. You can have an orange if you want, Ryohei got a ton of them after he helped out some lady with a fruit stand and chased off the delinquents bothering her." With a quiet 'eureka!' he dug out the lockbox and retrieved the enameled case.

"Really? Dino will want to know about that, the ten blocks of Palermo that we're in are Cavallone territory."

Tsuna pulled on his shoes, slid his gloves into one pocket, the Dying Will Pills in another, and looped his headphones around his neck. Normally, he wouldn't bother bringing his gear like he was, but being in the heartland of the Sicilian mafia was making him a mite more paranoid than usual. He put his contacts in easily, and at the press of a button they lit up. After a moment to calibrate, his vision was overlaid with a map of the city. He looped the Vongola Gear onto the chain around his neck and tucked it beneath his shirt. He put the box containing the Mare Rings into one of his pockets, and invited Reborn to hop on his shoulder.

His friends were already up and at it, waiting down in the lobby in a way that reminded Tsuna of elementary school kids waiting to leave the classroom with the teacher—down to the noise. After a good night's sleep Lambo was yelling and cheering, as obnoxious as ever. He was the only exception to the rule of wearing combat gear. Even Chrome wore hot pants under her skirt and had her hair pulled back into a style heavily reminiscent of a pineapple.

"Hey," Tsuna said, stopping in front of Gokudera. "Good luck with Lal."

Gokudera shivered. "Have a good day, Tenth. I tried to insist that it was my duty to accompany you, but she was…adamant."

It probably involved getting slapped in the face.

"I'll be fine, I'll be with Reborn, I've got my gear, and anyways Aria is a good person, she just puts her family first," he said. Gokudera still looked a little ill. "I'll see you guys at the party tonight."

"Sawada," said the too-familiar tutor. Lal Mirch stood in the doorway, tall and imposing, and gestured for the others to get moving. She was dressed in clothes very similar to the combat gear she had been in before, but without the gorilla-shaped shoulder guard, and with a knee-length open jacket instead of a cloak. She said something in rapid Italian, and when Tsuna looked at her blankly she charged up to him, grabbed him by the collar, and lifted him off his feet. "Try not to embarrass yourself, and if you pick a fight, keep in mind that you don't have home turf advantage."

"But I don't pick fights!"

"Then if somebody tries to pick a fight with you. Keep it in mind." She dropped him, pulled her goggles down over her eyes, and set a hand on her hip. "Get moving, before I start using this." She adjusted her coat to indicate the short-barreled shotgun strapped to her thigh. Tsuna was out the door so fast that Reborn nearly fell off.

* * *

There was no car waiting outside, but as Reborn quickly explained, the meeting place was a small café about ten blocks to the west of the hotel, in territory controlled by the Trad 6 organization. The city of Palermo was about evenly split between the Vongola and the Trad 6, with about ten blocks under the control of the Cavallone Family due to the old treaty that had inducted the Cavallone into the alliance in the first place. That the territory was controlled by the Trad 6 was why it was as near as neutral as they would find in the city—while the Trad 6 was officially part of the Vongola alliance, they had an economic agreement with the Giglio Nero. One based on friendship, as Aria and the chief executive of the Trad 6 had been friends in their school days.

"So, is there anything I should know about the Giglio Nero beforehand?" Tsuna said, shortly after leaving the hotel.

"They're on the small side," Reborn said. "Their history is longer than the Vongola's, indeed, longer than the Sicilian Mafia as a whole, reaching back to the 1750s when the sage called Sepira founded it to protect a town she had grown fond of. Like the Vongola, they were founded as peacekeepers, but they never strayed quite as far as the Vongola did, but they also never expanded their influence very much, only occasionally taking small settlements and farming towns under their protection. Their greatest strength in numbers and influence was during the Second World War, when they had nearly two-thousand subordinates. They like to share the story that Giglio Nero the Sixth once ended a countryside skirmish merely by inclining her head, and the Italian soldiers surrendered to Allied Forces."

"You don't believe that?"

"It's a fanciful story that was exaggerated to make them seem bigger. Luce, the Eighth, admitted it flat-out when I asked." He smiled at the memory.

Tsuna crossed the road continuing east, and said "So, they're more concerned with protecting their own than being powerful?"

"Exactly so." Reborn jabbed a pressure point in Tsuna's neck, making him hesitate in pain just long enough to avoid getting hit by a motorcyclist.

"So you said that they and the Vongola had different ideals, and I get how the different views on power could be a problem, but is that all of why Giglio Nero distrusts the Vongola?"

"That's something of a simplification. It's why there's tension, but the distrust comes from back in the early 60s. While under the leadership of the Seventh Boss, the Vongola tried to take over Giglio Nero's territory so they could take control of the vineyards in the area. During that time, Giglio Nero the Seventh was murdered, and it was almost certainly the responsibility of the Varia."

Tsuna flinched. "Eugh. But, not to discount their experiences, but the 60s? That's a long time to hold a grudge…"

"It was the start of a long period of instability for the Giglio Nero," Reborn said. "And they weren't in the best position to demand justice of the Vongola, or to think of forgetting the grudge in favor of restabilizing. The heir, Luce, was young when she came into her position, and died within a year of being cursed to carry the Orange Pacifier." Reborn took a long pause at that. Tsuna stayed silent so that he could collect his thoughts. "Right…the family fell under the control of its Consigliere until Aria came of age, and much of the progress she made fell apart after she became ill."

Tsuna nodded. "So, long-standing grudge, I'm guessing pressure on a small family to be merged into another, and instability. That…I can see why she might be reluctant to meet. Which way from here?" he said at a dead end with roads going left and right.

"Left then immediately right. Besides their history, the rumor mill is turning out gossip that Aria is trying to go legitimate. While Giglio Nero has always been nonviolent toward civilians, they've had their share of criminal activity, mostly extortion, information brokering, loan sharking, and gambling. That changed about six months ago."

Tsuna mentally checked the math, then smiled and said "When her daughter was born."

"You're catching on quickly."

"Well, what was that about mothers doing anything for their children? Although I can't remember where that's from…"

"Focus, No-Good Tsuna."

Partway down the block, sitting at an outdoor table of a picturesque little café with a name that Tsuna wouldn't remember in the years afterward, was a woman with long black hair and clear blue eyes, a child wrapped in a blanket in her arms. As Tsuna approached, he felt like he was a few steps behind his body.

Aria stood, her daughter in her arms, and held her with one arm so that she could shake Tsuna's hand. Reborn sat on the table and waited patiently. Aria inclined her head, and Gamma appeared—looking so much more _alive_ than he had six months before—to hold the child for a moment so that Aria could bend over to kiss Tsuna on each cheek and embrace him.

"There aren't enough words to describe my gratitude towards you, Tsunayoshi," she said quietly. "Thank you, thank you, thank you. Everything I ever saw in my future, was a future where I would never even be able to hold her, and you defied it all with your brow narrowed and fists held as though in prayer." She released him, and turned away to compose herself.

"Boss," Gamma said gently.

"I'm fine," she said, turning around and taking her daughter back into her arms. "Please, sit. Tsunayoshi, Reborn, I'd like you to meet my daughter, Yuni. Oh, my dearest, I'm sorry, did I wake you?"

Tsuna leaned forward in his seat. The baby girl was still sleepy, but when she caught sight of him, she focused on him intently with big blue eyes. He said softly "Hi, Yuni. Sorry to wake you."

"She's only six months, of course, so she's a long way off from even saying her first word," Aria said. "But she's very healthy, and very happy. Yuni, this is your cousin, Tsuna. And that one over there trying severely to keep from getting flustered is your _Zio,_ your Uncle Reborn."

Tsuna turned to look and laughed aloud at Reborn pulling the brim of his hat over his eyes but failing to hide the stupid smile on his face—and then Yuni imitated the wonderful new sound with 'Zi-zi-zi-ziiiii' and Tsuna would later swear that his tutor, 'World's Greatest Hitman' among other titles, was going red in the face.

"And with the introductions taken care of," Aria said. "You asked for this meeting, Tsunayoshi. How can I help you?"

Tsuna took a long moment to refocus himself. "Um…oh, right, sorry, got distracted. There's something I need to give you." He pulled the box from his pocket and set it on the table between himself and Aria. Her expression became serious, even as Yuni cooed and pulled at one of her curls. "The Mare Rings were sealed in this time, but that only sealed their 'miracle' to connected to parallel worlds. I was entrusted with keeping them secure, but they are yours, aren't they?"

"…The rings have always been cared for by my family, yes. They vanished from the vault a while back, the same night that I dreamed of those events in that future. I thought they had been destroyed."

"If you want to destroy them, then that's your right," Tsuna said.

It was Reborn's turn to cut in. "You should know, the way the wind is blowing, having such treasures under your family's control may be far better than destroying them."

"The Box Weapons, yes," Aria said absently. She touched the ring case lightly, as though afraid it would bite. "I don't know that I would be allowed to wear the Sky Mare Ring, even if the miracle has been sealed. Indeed, while officers of the family have always been selected to care for a ring, the boss of Giglio Nero has never worn the Sky Ring, even before my mother became the Sky Arcobaleno."

"It's yours," Tsuna said, surprising himself with his certainty. "Uh…sorry, I don't know where that came from."

Aria looked him in the eye and smiled. She opened the box and examined its contents with her eyes, then said "Will you lend me a hand, Tsunayoshi?"

"Okay, I guess, um." He took the center ring with widespread wings, and Aria held out her right hand. He carefully slid the ring on her middle finger, and he could almost _feel_ a pulse of energy, like the universe sighing in relief, and the gem turned from cloudy white to orange.

"Feeling any megalomania?" Reborn said, raising an eyebrow.

"Nope." Aria tightened her hand into a fist, and a pure orange Sky Flame was lit on the surface of the ring. "Just relief. If there were anything of the curse left, I doubt I would have been able to wear this ring, even as a treasure of the family." She picked one of the rings out of the box and said "Oi, Gamma, think fast!" She flicked it through the air, and he snatched the ring easily. "Well? I've seen that tarnished silver ring you've been using, use a ring befitting your station."

"Yes, boss," he said, pulling off the other ring and stuffing it in his pocket, and slipping on the Mare Ring.

Aria took the box and slipped it into her pocket. "I have a few thoughts for who will care for the others, but until then, they will be kept safe. Thank you for returning my family's treasures, Tsunayoshi. And in gratitude, I'll give you some information that you might find useful." Her smile slipped. "Those people—that is, Bluebell, Daisy, Zakuro, Torikabuto, Kikyo, and Byakuran—they have all vanished."

Tsuna's heart skipped a beat, and he couldn't keep himself from putting a hand on the Vongola Gear hanging at his neck. "Just like that?"

"Just like that," she said grimly. "I saw them once, after returning to my family. Apparently, they had been sticking around at our headquarters, made it seem like they were going to ask to join the Giglio Nero. But Byakuran just stopped to say hello to Yuni and I, and the next day they were gone. I've been so busy with business that I haven't been comfortable putting any resources towards tracking them down."

"When we return to Japan, Tsuna will get in touch with Shoichi Irie," Reborn said.

"Hey, that's—" Tsuna rethought it, then said "Actually, even in this world Byakuran seemed attached to Shoichi. I'll talk to him, see if he's heard anything. I'll let you know if there's anything interesting that comes up."

"Thank you, Tsunayoshi. I cannot help but feel responsible for him. Even if there's no possibility of him becoming, as Reborn put it, megalomaniacal—well, I suppose he could, but it would be far more difficult to act upon. At any rate, I'd like to have some idea of what he's up to. Thank you."

Tsuna shook his head. "Don't worry about it, I know the feeling, sort of. A little bit after the Representative Battle, Mukuro Rokudo took off, leaving the Vongola Gear of the Mist and his allies behind, and nobody's heard a word from him since. I want to believe he isn't up to anything, but…"

"But you still feel responsible for him."

"Yeah. Yeah." Tsuna sighed. "Although, I guess that doesn't really measure up in my case. The ex-Funeral Wreathes are still with Byakuran as far as we know. Meanwhile, of Mukuro's subordinates, Ken and Chikusa are beating up Yakuza in Tokyo, Fran is being trained as an officer of the Varia, M.M. got scouted for the Varia as well, and I selected Chrome as my Mist Guardian, officially. Ah, sorry, I got off track. But, like I said, if I can find anything, I'll make sure the information gets to you."

He sighed again, putting his hand over his mouth in thought, and said "Reborn, you said you needed to discuss something with Aria? I'm gonna go get a coffee so you can talk privately."

"I'll join you," Gamma said suddenly, standing as Tsuna did to follow him into the shop.

As Tsuna clumsily ordered four espressos, Gamma put a hand on his shoulder. The Mare Ring had turned bright green. He spoke Japanese nearly as roughly as Tsuna spoke Italian. "Vongola—if you're ever in need, one word and I'll be there to give you aid, it is the least I can do to repay that debt."

Tsuna considered his answer for a moment. "Thanks. And the same to you, and the rest of Giglio Nero. You, and Nosaru and Tazaru, and even if Byakuran left he was still acting in the name of the Giglio Nero; we wouldn't have stood a chance without all of your help."

Gamma shook his head. "Kid, you're really not made for this world we live in. Sorry you have to get dragged into it."

"Don't be sorry. I don't plan to succeed Vongola; I'll destroy it before I ever become the kind of person who would." He paid for his drinks with a new ten euro note (there had been an envelope in his room with some cash as an allowance), and set the change in the tip jar. He took the first of the drinks and offered it to Gamma; he took it absently.

Gamma stood in place as Tsuna walked away. He watched through the window as Vongola's would-be Tenth vehemently refused an offer to hold Yuni, citing his own clumsiness and nerves.

Gamma had observed the battle that Tsuna had fought with Bermuda von Veckenstein, and more to the point, he saw the resolve with which he had went against Checkerface, tearing down the Arcobaleno System with his bare hands despite the fact that everyone he turned to said that it was impossible.

He did not doubt that Tsuna had the resolve to destroy the Vongola. The only question was whether he would stick around to pick up the pieces.

* * *

 _A/N: Orange no longer looks like a word I've typed it so much!_

 _Interesting fact of the day: Ken Narita, who voiced Adult!Reborn during the Arcobaleno Trials arc of the anime, also voiced Jeremiah 'Orange' Gottwald from Code Geass. Don't know what that means, but it tickled my fancy when I learned it back when I was into CG._

 _Opera is named after the idea of the Opera mask, Thalia and Melpomene are named for the muses in Greek mythology of Comedy and Tragedy, whose symbols were of a laughing mask and a weeping mask, and Gaksital is named for a type of Korean bridal mask._

 _Next time, the Cavallone Family Halloween Party! Which has just as much to do with the content of the arc named for it, as the Inheritance Ceremony had to do with its arc. Perhaps even less._


	12. The Party

**Target 12: The Party**

Out in the Sicilian countryside, about an hour away from Palermo, there is a town called Veruda that was, for the longest time, of little significance. Most of the population either worked for the vineyard on the outskirts of town, or commuted daily into Palermo. As a consequence, when the owner of the vineyard decided to close it down, it was assumed that the town would fall apart as people tried to move away for greener pastures, leaving behind the unfortunate, poor, and destitute.

That was about seven years ago; soon afterwards, however, a young man with hair of gold came to Veruda, claimed as his inheritance a mansion just outside town, bought up the vineyard and rehired its employees, and claimed the town of Veruda as being under the protection of Bucking Horse Dino of the Cavallone Family.

In those five years, Veruda went from a village on the verge of vanishing off the maps, to a thriving town, and the only real downside was that about once a year, they got to deal with massive numbers of creepy Mafiosi coming into town for a Halloween gala at Bucking Horse Dino's mansion. Since Dino usually agreed to pay for any broken windows, however, the townsfolk were able to put up with it pretty well.

Even if this year the Smokin' Bomb set a new record for most destruction caused, and that was at 6 o' clock.

* * *

Tsuna had been trusted with the responsibility to get himself to Veruda by 7. He naturally got there with a minute to spare, with his costume only halfway on. He shook his head as he ran in the front door, clipped the straps of his overalls in place, checked his boots to make sure he wouldn't trip over his laces, and shoved his headphones away in a pocket. "Okay, looking good," he said quietly, and ran directly into the back of another guest waiting to get in. "Hiii! I'm so sorry!"

The heavy-set Mafioso turned around and glared so heavily at Tsuna that he was sure he would crumble under the weight of it. The Mafioso grabbed Tsuna by the front of the shirt, but had done no more than that before a whip snaked in and cracked against his face with sufficient force to draw blood. The Mafioso released Tsuna and backed off.

"You okay, Tsuna?" Dino said, recoiling his whip as he walked up in a full western cowboy getup, complete with a Stetson, spurs, and an exaggerated bow-legged walk.

"Yeah, I'm fine."

The man wiped the blood away from his face, and spat something in Italian. Dino replied coldly in kind, and the man's eyes widened as he looked to Tsuna. He dropped his gaze as he said "Forgive my stupidity, Tenth."

"No no, it's okay, it really is," Tsuna said, moving away quickly from the Mafioso. Dino threw a look at the woman checking the guest list at the door, and pulled Tsuna along by the shoulders.

"Well, the first of many exciting events tonight, I'm sure," Dino said, and laughed.

"Wait, that's not weird for guests to be threatened?"

"This may be a party for associates of the Cavallone, but that still leaves a lot of criminals whose first recourse is either violence, or more wine." Dino sighed, and side-eyed Tsuna. "So what are you supposed to be, little bro? A farmer?"

"Something like that. Me and my friends are doing a group costume, sort of. It was Gokudera's idea."

"Oh? I'll need to see the rest of these costumes, I think I saw your Guardians in the ballroom, but I didn't get a good look." Dino smiled big. "By the way, thanks for coming. I was so happy to hear you were coming to my own personal Namimori."

Tsuna just smiled and nodded as Dino pulled him into the ballroom where the party was going. Guests milled about in costume, some more intricate than others, and some Tsuna knew that he recognized from some place or another. There was music playing, but nobody was really dancing, it was too early and most of the guests were too sober to make fools out of themselves yet. An open bar was set up, and the bartender was dressed up in a full bunny suit as he served drinks.

"Although that'll have to wait, I have to open the party," Dino said, rolling his eyes. "I saw your Guardians over yonder, talk to you in a few, okay?"

"Got it, Dino." Tsuna made his way around sides of the ballroom, trying to avoid running into anyone again, but he picked up the pace when he heard the familiar sound of Gokudera chastising Yamamoto.

"Your facepaint is smudged!"

"No, it isn't, it's fine."

"Don't embarrass the Tenth, baseball-idiot!"

Gokudera had a pair of cat ears on his head, a fuzzy plastic tail attached to the back of his jeans, and catspaw shoes on his feet, all in a shade of gray that matched his hair. Yellow-tinted contacts that gave the appearance of slitted pupils finished off the look and made him look a little unsettling.

Yamamoto, meanwhile, was wearing an old baseball uniform covered in dripped fake blood, had painted his face dark green with a drawn-on scar across his forehead, and wore a plastic axe prop on his head that made it look like it was embedded in his skull. Tsuna couldn't tell whether or not his face paint actually was smudged or not, but in the clothes he was wearing it was probably inevitable that he would start to sweat it off.

"You guys both look good, alright? Better than me, at least, Dino thought I was a farmer."

"Isn't that the point, though?" Yamamoto said cheerfully. "The normal kid who gets the weirdos to fight beside him."

 _…Oh god he's becoming self-aware._

"At least, that's how Gokudera's little story went."

 _Or not._

"At any rate, if you feel like you have to hang around me all night, Gokudera, feel free." He didn't mention that it was because he felt really weird in the overalls and would feel normal compared to a cat-boy.

"Absolutely, Tenth! I won't leave your side, now or ever!"

"…Right. Uh, where's everyone else, are they here?"

"Nnnnnnngh, to the extreme…" Ryohei walked stiff-legged, arms stretched out, his skin made to look washed out with a coating of gray makeup powder, and the head of a large screw stuck to his head with bobby pins. "Automaton Ryohei, reporting for duty, to the extreme! And—" He spun around to indicate Lambo, dangling from his shoulders, with clumps of dyed-yellow cotton attached to a belt to make it look like a cloud, and a miniature-sized ring of yellow drums that were somehow harnessed to his back. Tsuna made a mental note to ask Haru how in the world she had managed to make that prop. "Lightning Bolt Lambo!"

Gokudera had tried to convince Lambo to dress up as a minotaur, and had been utterly unsuccessful. Lambo had wanted to go as a clown, despite Gokudera's insistence that it had to be actual monsters. They had come with a compromise by having him come as a mythological lightning god.

Last came Chrome, who had agreed to dress as a mummy, but showed up in a sheer white dress with bandages around her head and covering her eye, and more down her neck and all along her arms and legs. When Tsuna seen it, he had agreed to it only on the condition that she guarantee she wouldn't cut off her own circulation from the bandages. That had required some clever use of safety pins to keep the bandages in place without being too tight. But overall, combined with the empty expression she had affected and the makeup that made her face look washed-out and dead, she succeeded in putting a shiver down Tsuna's spine.

"Just wait til you see Hibari," Ryohei said suddenly.

"Wait, he's _here_?" Tsuna said, less in fear and more in sheer disbelief.

"Mm. Sitting up on the top floor bannister," Ryohei said, nodding. "And he's got these—" He bared his teeth and indicated his canines with a point. "Plastic, I think, but good enough to deliver his threats with them in."

 _He actually came as a vampire. I mean, from the sounds of it, a disciplinarian vampire, but still! Now all we need is for 'Eldo Rebo' and Gokudera's story will be perfect. I can't believe I agreed to this._

The crack of a whip cut through the air and brought the guests to quietly mutter as they looked to the dais at the north end of the ballroom, where Dino and several of his men—all dressed in cowboy outfits matching their boss—stood to open the gala. "Welcome, esteemed guests!" Dino called. "I'm proud to have you all here to celebrate the favorite holiday of myself, my family, and I'm sure many of you here as well! One night a year to cast out the old monsters and let the ghosts mingle amongst the living! After all, I'm sure nobody came here just for the free drinks, right?"

"Hear hear!" shouted out a man dressed as a ballerina, as he raised a glass of wine.

"Exactly what I like to hear! Drink up and enjoy yourselves! The winners for best individual costume, best group costume, and other runners-up will be announced at midnight! Reminder, please keep live explosives out of the ballroom, even if you don't win the costume contest!"

Four pairs of eyes went to Gokudera, who shuffled nervously on his feet and averted his eyes.

* * *

An hour later, Tsuna was entertaining himself by watching the bartender in the bunny suit expertly make mixed drinks by flipping the bottles through the air and dropping measured amounts into the glasses. Not that he ever ordered a drink, for a variety of factors: an ingrained distaste towards alcohol caused by his father's drinking it to excess; being fairly certain that at 5'4" tall and 125 pounds soaking wet he would therefore be a massive lightweight; and that Hibari was enforcing legal drinking age with great vigor, even though his arms had been checked at the door.

And it wasn't only him, but all of the guests who had brought arms had them locked up to avoid any brawls getting too lethal. Even Tsuna had been approached by Romario soon after the party opened to ask that he relinquish his gloves. They didn't want it to seem as though Dino was playing favorites. Tsuna and his Guardians had been allowed to keep the Vongola Gear, but it would be only so helpful if they did need to defend themselves, given that most of the Vongola Gear still required an existing weapon to be used as a medium through which the Cambio Forma mode was manifested, which severely limited or, in Tsuna's case, destroyed their combat ability.

Plus, it was just anxiety-inducing any more to be without the X-Gloves when he usually kept them on his person at all times; the furthest they ever got was sitting on the sink when he was showering. They were like a mafia security blanket. Sort of like how Reborn was with his pistol, only far more socially acceptable.

 _It's just a party and Dino's entire family is on guard there isn't going to be a problem that requires a fight to fix. Agh this was such a bad idea why am I even here I'm one of the youngest people in the room and I just look dumb in this outfit._

"Piece of eight for your thoughts?"

"Dino, you're kinda stretching the persona…"

Tsuna looked up, and found Dino standing next to another man in a 'mysterious stranger' sort of costume—black Stetson and vest, and a black cloth mask over his eyes. His only identifying feature was the shock of red hair spilling out from under his hat.

"Oh, what do you know?"

"Well I spent a few years in America, for one…"

"Tsuna, I'd like you to meet my boyfriend, Alato," Dino said plowing right ahead.

Alato pulled off his glove and put out his hand. " _Ciao, Vongola._ Pleasure to meet you at last, Tsuna. I've heard so much about you from Dino. Really, he never shuts up." Dino went a little red in the face as Alato shook Tsuna's hand. "Although, I have to say, I thought you'd be a little…taller."

A furious ball of tinfoil and pink pushed her way past Dino and Alato, looked up at Tsuna, and squinted at him. "Dinoooo, you said he had fire for hair!"

"I said his head sometimes lit with a flame," Dino said. He looked from Alato to the newcomer to Tsuna, shrugged, and sighed. "This is my little cousin, Yomary. She is, correct me if I'm wrong, a robot fairy princess?"

"Super robot fairy princess!" She spun around to indicate the red towel tied to her back like a cape. She had a cardboard box covered in tinfoil and marked up with blue markers over her head, and a tutu and ballet flats. She couldn't have been any older than eight.

Dino sidled up alongside Tsuna as Yomary 'cast a spell' on Alato to make him dance at her command, and said quietly "On my mother's side, of course, but she doesn't know anything about my work."

 _'Of course'…oh, right, the family must be through his father, so she couldn't inherit it. I mean, she's just a little kid, of course she couldn't._

Of course, Tsuna had also been only twelve when Reborn had showed up at his door, so maybe it wasn't so absurd.

Dino shook his head, smiled, and looked Tsuna over. "So, we got old McDonald, where's your animals?

"I mean, I'm not a farmer…"

"He's a Monster Tamer!" Gokudera pushed his way through the partygoers, got right up in Dino's face, and said with a wild look in his eye. "Don't you know the story of Tsuna, the weakest, most cowardly boy in the village!?"

 _Oh well thanks for the reminder that I'm pathetic._

"The descendant of the monster tamers, he was destined to become a monster tamer himself, and he became the greatest of them, Hyper Monster Tamer Tsuna!" Gokudera had fire in his eyes as he recited off the backstory he had written to explain the costume idea.

Dino raised an eyebrow in curiosity. "So that makes you what, a werewolf?"

"Naturally, for I am the first of the monsters he tamed to aid him on his quest to take on the most powerful and evil of monsters!"

"Uh-huh." Dino seemed like he was about to break out laughing. Tsuna shook his head, stood up, and took a deep breath.

"Technically, he's a werecat, not a werewolf." Tsuna pulled out a plastic fish he had put in his pocket, tossed it to Gokudera, and like an overly-large housecat he snapped it up greedily.

"And that's why he's the boss, because he was the first person to recognize that!" Gokudera said loudly, pointing the plastic fish at Dino. It wobbled back and forth.

 _Why is he so into it? It's just a stupid costume contest…_

Gokudera looked back at Tsuna, and winked.

 _…That is exactly why he's getting into it. It's just a Halloween party._ Tsuna forced himself to stand up straight, clapped Gokudera on the shoulder, and said with all the conviction he could muster "That's right! It's why I'm the Tenth Gen Monster Tamer, here to save the party from the wicked vampire Hibarin!"

Behind Dino, Alato choked on his drink. Well, if he knew anything about Tsuna, he would probably know everything about Hibari.

And then everything went completely off-script when Reborn came flying through the air and struck Tsuna on the side of the head so hard that he got thrown to the ground head-over-heels. "You still have a long way to go before you can think of calling yourself a Hyper Monster Tamer—more like a No-Good Monster Tamer." He was quite comfortable in a wizard's outfit, replete with blue robe, a pointed hat decorated with stars that Leon's eyes peered out of, and an apparently flying broomstick—it took Tsuna three glances to see the wires it was suspended from. It would have taken only two, but everything was spinning from the hit.

Dino did a double-take at Reborn's getup, and frowned. "Aw, you play along with his group costumes but never once did you come near the mansion when you were training me. Must have an attachment to him or something…"

"Careful, or I might lay a curse on you." Reborn had a gun in hand and a wicked gleam in his eye.

"Okay, okay, I give I give!" Dino stepped back with his hands up, wisely deciding not to question how he had slipped a gun past his men.

"Good idea. The last person to give lip to the great wizard Eldo Rebo—well, he wound up like that," Reborn said, and gestured to Tsuna.

"Dressed as a medieval peasant constantly mistaken for a farmer at a Halloween Party?" _…Well, actually, if I hadn't made that promise about wearing whatever stupid costume he wanted…_ "Urgh, Gokudera—Gokudera?"

"Right here, Tenth!" Gokudera came pushing through the partygoers, pulling along Ryohei, still chewing on a cracker, and Yamamoto, adjusting his sleeves.

"Oh?" said Alato, raising an eyebrow. "Frankenstein's Monster and a Zombie?"

Ryohei swallowed the last of his cracker, held out his arms, made his jaw go slack, and groaned "Nnnngh, to the extreme…"

"Please to meetcha!" Yamamoto said, affecting a pitch an octave higher than his normal voice that served to make him just a little unsettling. "I'm Yamamoto, the friendly zombie!"

"My, such a happy zombie, you must have died a peaceful death," Alato remarked.

Yamamoto smiled. "Mm, you could say that. My friends betrayed me, killed me, and raised me as a zombie!" That had been his idea, since beyond empty-headed zombie Gokudera hadn't fleshed out the character much.

Alato's eyes widened, and he stepped behind Dino, peering out over his shoulder.

"I love it!" Dino said, with a wide grin. "Oh, but, where's Lambo, and Dokuro?"

Reborn seemed to agree with the question with a sideye at Tsuna.

"Lambo's still got some jet lag, he's asleep in a guest room that Romario pointed me to," Tsuna said, although he had made plans to stick to his end of the deal he had cut with Reborn. "And Chrome is…"

"Right here." She pushed her way from the back, apologizing the whole way, then came up beside Tsuna with her neck—and presumably her face—turning red. "I'm sorry, boss, I needed some fresh air."

Dino smiled. "Pleasure to see you again, Dokuro. That makeup work is the best I've seen all night." Chrome blushed even harder, but stammered out a thanks.

There was a sound of breaking glass as Alato dropped his drink. His eyes were fixed on Chrome, and he seemed aware of little else. Dino put a hand on his shoulder, and Alato blinked. "I…Dokuro?"

"Chrome Dokuro," Tsuna said. "She's a friend, and my Guardian of Mist."

"Right," Alato said, still seeming a little dazed. He touched the brim of his hat. "Enchantee, Miss Dokuro."

Chrome was staring at her own shoes. "Enchantee."

Dino clapped his hands together to break the awkward silence. "Right! Well, no spoilers, but you might want to stick around for the announcement of the winners at midnight! Oh, god, the Beccia are going to flip their lids if they get passed over again this year…"

Chrome was just about to go running when Alato touched her shoulder as the others milled away. "Hey, ah, Dokuro, could I talk to you a second? In private?"

She looked him up and down—he was lithe, probably weaker of limb than even she was, and his features were smooth and prim. She felt nearly naked without her spear on her person. "Alright."

Alato led her to a side hall—on the way there, Chrome met Tsuna's eyes, and he raised an eyebrow as though in question. She nodded, and turned away from him. _Whatever he wants, it'll be fine._ He led her through a door, and kept the door open partway.

"What did you need?"

"Sorry—I just want to make sure I'm not crazy," Alato said, rubbing the back of his head. He pulled off his hat and mask, letting his shock of red hair spill out.

"Well, I'm not exactly the best judge of 'crazy', and the voices in my head agree," Chrome said, completely deadpan. When Alato just looked at her awkwardly, she added "That was a joke."

"Right." Alato shook his head. "I mean…I'm sorry, but there just aren't that many young women with violet eyes in the world. You are Nagi Moto, aren't you?"

The temperature seemed to drop a few degrees at the mention of that name. Chrome wrung her hands together. "Once, but not anymore. Please, can I go?"

He didn't notice her hand shaking. "Perhaps you don't remember me—I worked for an associate of your father's for a while. We met at a Christmas party in _Giappone._ "

"Step-father."

"Step-father, then. I was an intern, for a long while, and still kept up with the news. Is there any truth to those stories? That you vanished from the hospital bed?"

"Sounds right." Chrome had no idea, in reality; she had fallen asleep in the hospital, and woken up in a hotel room wearing a new set of clothes.

"Does your boss know anything about just who you are, Nagi?"

Chrome turned, looked him straight in the eye, and he flinched at the killer intent. "I offered to tell him, once. He told me that if I wasn't comfortable talking about it, I didn't have to. Don't call me that name, please. I'm not that person anymore."

"A-alright," he said, although he put up an eyebrow as though in disbelief. "Whatever you say, Dokuro."

Chrome wrapped her arms around herself, trying to keep her cool until Alato was out of sight. She collapsed into a chair in the hallway, covered her face with one hand, and bit her lip as hard as she could, hoping the pain would make her forget the lonely ICU and cold and empty days. _They knew a lot of people. Both of them. If he would remember me, from one meeting years ago, then won't others? What if the word spreads? What if they…_ The very thought of her mother and step-father finding out she was still alive made her hold herself tighter, even as she wanted to go running. _I've got to pull myself together. I'm here as boss's Mist Guardian, I can't make a scene._

She pulled her hand away from her face, and nearly started crying when on top of everything else her makeup was coming off. _I hope everyone else is having a better night, at least._

* * *

Meanwhile, Gokudera had ducked outside to smoke a cigarette. He had gotten a lot better about it more recently, but the stress of so many people around was scraping on his nerves. He set a hand on his hip as he took a long drag, taking in the sound of crickets and the paper burning away.

Invisible threats quickly made his heart race, whether real or imaginary threats it made no difference. Forget what that driver said; it was his responsibility to protect the Tenth, especially with so many people around. Especially then.

 _"Every two-bit gang-banger imagines cutting off the head of the Vongola."_ And then a memory of a coffin bearing an 'X'.

He breathed out a cloud of smoke. It was almost a relief when a target presented itself.

"I know you're there. Come out, and I might leave enough of a body that your Family can bury you." He nearly laughed when the costumed man came out of the shadows of the garden. "The hell are you supposed to be, Tuxedo Mask?"

The man couldn't have been much older than thirty, although it was a little hard to make a good guess under the white half-mask and black trilby. From what little Gokudera could see of the man beneath the black cloak, he was trim and fit, although not particularly strong. He was relatively generic of feature although Gokudera felt like he recognized him from somewhere.

"Uncultured brat," the man spat. "And I'll say it again, just for good measure. God, how old are you even, thirteen? Stand aside, I have business with Don Cavallone."

The man stepped forward, but Gokudera made no indication of moving—quite the opposite, he grabbed the man by his collar and yanked him up high enough that his toes barely touched the ground. "Not gonna happen." The Bucking Horse couldn't take all his weapons—a piece of dynamite slipped from the case he had up his sleeve.

"Brat! I am Dante di Adamo, now unhand me!"

Gokudera barked with laughter as he realized where he recognized him from. "Adamo? Adamo Terzo? What a joke, you think that's going to impress anyone?" He released the man's collar and shoved him back in the same movement. "Somehow, I doubt you were invited to _this_ party, considering your history with the Vongola."

"Do I really look old enough that I was involved in that ancient history?" Dante di Adamo's voice was youthful, and when he complained he sounded nearly like a teenager. "That was over forty years ago. Besides, I'm not here to wage war, I'm just here on business with Don Cavallone."

He reached forward as though to push Gokudera aside, only to draw back when a swarm of Storm Flame erupted from his belt and landed on his shoulder in the form of the Storm Leopard Uri. His eyes widened. "You…"

"Hayato Gokudera, Tenth Storm Guardian for the Vongola Family," Gokudera said, as Uri tracked Dante with a sharp gaze. "And you are…Adamo the Third, and Adamo the last if you had your way. I heard you were trying to go legitimate—five years ago."

"There's been some setbacks," Adamo admitted quietly. "But then, everyone knows what Cavallone's Tenth was able to do in regards to his family's finances. Who better to ask for aid?"

"Hm…well. Let's count the mistakes, then. First—" Gokudera stepped forward so he could get right in his face. "You're unable to get a proper meeting with the bronco so you decide to come talk business at a party." Adamo stepped back, only for Gokudera to move forward after him. "Second, you _sneak in_ two hours after the party started, because you weren't invited." He turned over the piece of dynamite between his fingers. "And _three_ , you tried to sneak past the one person most dedicated to their boss at this party."

Dante ground his teeth together. He moved his hand behind his back; on it, he wore a ring into which was set an orange beryl stone, inscribed with the emblem of a family that had not existed for nearly fifty years. It ignited with a brilliant sky flame, while the tiny black diamonds set into the ring glowed with dark light. _Just one touch, and he'll be out of my way for a good long while. The smartass Vongola might learn not to open his mouth._

Uri growled at Adamo, and the light of her flame cast a reflection off the golden band he wore on his left hand. He extinguished the flame on his ring and backed up a step. "Kid—you don't know how lucky you are."

The dynamite vanished up his sleeve again, and Gokudera flipped both middle fingers at him as Dante di Adamo walked away. "Piece of shit…"

* * *

At about ten to midnight, the party only seemed to be heating up, but Tsuna's Guardians had vanished from the building—even Hibari had abandoned his post on the balcony. He was only a little surprised to find everyone outside in the garden, sitting on the grass, Ryohei trying to bait Hibari into a fight, and the others trying to keep a fight from starting.

 _I feel like I should intervene, but on the other hand what would I do without my gloves?_ He frowned. _And on the third hand, if Reborn catches me slacking he'll probably punt me between them. Aaagh._ "Hibari, I didn't think you would come."

Hibari side-eyed Tsuna, and his lip curled just enough to reveal the plastic fangs between his teeth—and then the bit of fake blood running down one corner of his mouth. "I thought there might be a person worth biting to death here. You'll have to do."

"Wait wait Hibari!" Tsuna threw his arms up, but the expected attack never came. When he looked up, Hibari was looking past him.

"Oi, Vongola!"

 _Oh, that's never a good start to a conversation._ Tsuna reluctantly turned to face the newcomers, and recognized them by their group costume—several representatives of the Beccia Family, dressed as a royal court complete with king, jester, herald, knight (who had to have been sweating under the genuine plate mail), and prince.

"Can I help you?"

"Don't play dumb!" said King Beccia, a forty-something with wild eyebrows. "You've stolen what is rightfully mine! For the past year, I've been planning this costume, I've spent thousands of dollars, only to lose to what, dollar store costumes thanks to favoritism from the Cavallone!"

 _Thousands? The costume isn't that great…_ "Uh…sorry?"

"Spit out what you want, already," Gokudera said, scowling.

"Oh, just a little payback. Get him!"

Beccia's royal court pulled out bats and crowbars. Tsuna just sighed, and said "Please, I really don't want to fight you guys, especially over some dumb costume contest."

Even as he said it, he ignited the Sky Ring with his flame in time with his Guardians. Their box animals appeared in six shades of flame. Garyuu thumped the ground with her foot, and shots laced with activating sun flames flew from her pouch and straight at the rapidly solidifying shape on Tsuna's shoulder. He was nearly knocked down by the sudden weight and the pressure of it leaping from his shoulder, and nearly deafened by the low growl that turned into a roar that made the air itself seem to shake.

King Beccia paled, and took a step back even as the golden, adult lion with armor on its hackles, a mane of sky flames, and orange eyes to match his owner stepped up to him, so close he could feel the heat of its breath. Nuts bared his teeth at King Beccia.

 _"I see, it's a juvenile cat, like Uri!" Gokudera said, even as Tsuna scratched the Sky Lion behind the ears. "And that means, you could use sun flames to make it grow the same way!"_

 _"I guess I could," Tsuna said, uncertainly._

 _"Keep in mind, Gokudera, the Sky Lion isn't like the Storm Leopard," Dino said. "Even as juveniles, the Sky Lion's greatest ability, the Ruggito di Cieli, is still useable. The strength of the ability is dependent only on the strength of its user's flames. And additionally, you need to keep in mind that you and Tsuna have very different styles of fighting."_

 _"Obviously!"_

 _"But you still don't seem to be understanding. Your greatest strength is your firepower, and one of your weaknesses is the lack of speed. And even with the addition of the storm disc, you're still entirely on the ground. Meanwhile, Tsuna's greatest asset is his speed, and having a box weapon stuck on the ground could compromise his ability to work in concert with it. But, if the Sky Lion remains a cub…"_

 _"He can ride on my shoulder," Tsuna said. "Or, uh, y'know. Wherever he likes. Although I might need some kind of pad on my shoulder, so that Nuts doesn't claw me while holding on."_

 _Dino smiled. "Nuts?"_

 _"Like Na-Tsu? I don't know, I just thought of it. What do you think?" Tsuna said, aiming the question at the Sky Lion. He growled happily. "See, he likes it. Nuts it is."_

Tsuna smiled. "But there are some circumstances where a full-grown lion is called for," he muttered. "Like stopping a fight before it begins." He tucked his hands into his pockets. "Don Beccia," he said loudly.

Beccia ground his teeth together, and called off his men. "Bah!"

Tsuna could only rub his forehead as they walked away. _Ugh, I need to figure out a way to avoid this party next year. Bet Hibari would be willing to break my leg for me._

"So we won the costume contest?" Yamamoto said, a smile tugging at his lips. "Looks like it's time to celebrate! Gokudera, you brought those things?!"

"Of course I did!" And just like that, Gokudera produced a bundle of fireworks from somewhere on his person.

"Where did you…" Tsuna shook his head, and said "No, no, nevermind, I don't want to know." He gave Nuts a scratch behind the ears, and was nearly thrown off his feet when the much larger lion moved into it and pushed against him. "Oi, oi, Nuts, you're a lot bigger than usual, watch it! C'mon!"

Nuts growled deep—although it was probably supposed to be a purr, judging from the sad look in his eyes—and pawed Tsuna in apology. That did knock him off-balance, to one side, and overcompensating to the other, fallings over Nuts' back.

Then Gokudera lit the first of the fireworks, and when it shot into the air and exploded a hundred feet up, Nuts freaked out at the noise and tried to hide behind Tsuna.

Needless to say, it was an exercise in futility for the 440 pound adult lion.

"Even full-grown, you're still a scaredy-cat. Says good things about my future, doesn't it?"

"Tsuna, you want a try?" Yamamoto said, as he tried to light a roman candle still in his hand.

"Uh, depends, are there any sparklers?"

Ryohei raised an eyebrow. "Aw, come on, Sawada, have a little fun, to the extreme!"

The roman candle went off, and the star flew over the house and went off loud and bright. Tsuna smiled, sat down on the ground, and laid back with his hands folded behind his head. "I think I'll just watch, thanks."

A red-and-gold rocket went up, and for a moment, everything was alright in the world.

* * *

 _A/N: And that's the party. Like I said, for being the source of the name of the miniarc, it's not a very big part of the arc, even if there are some things here and there..._

 _Tsuna and his Guardians' costumes are all based off of what they were in the chibi series Monster Tamer Tsuna. It's pretty adorable, if you haven't watched it._

 _Alato, Yomary, and Dante di Adamo are all my original characters. Adamo's costume is meant to be the Phantom of the Opera, but Gokudera thought that he was Tuxedo Mask from Sailor Moon._

 _Next time: meeting with the Ninth Generation? (And maybe this time it won't be a trick). Target 13: Giotto's Villa is next!_


	13. Giotto's Villa

_Edit: The first version of this chapter referred to Daniela as Timoteo's sister. It has been revised to refer to her as Timoteo's mother._

 **Target 13: Giotto's Villa**

The last thing that Tsuna expected at his door at 8 AM was an Italian delinquent with his hair in a short Mohawk dyed bright green, slouching in his leather jacket and a toothpick held between his teeth.

"Uh…" If Tsuna were less tired, or had less experience meeting delinquents over the past two years, he might have been scared of the boy at his door, but this one had absolutely no killing intent or really any kind of presence. The slouch wasn't out of aloofness or disinterest, it was from being tired himself. "Can I help you?"

The delinquent spoke Japanese slowly and deliberately. "The Captain asked me to give an answer to your invitation, and he refuses it."

"The…Captain?" Tsuna said, although he had a sinking feeling about who the delinquent was talking about.

"Mr. Hibari?"

"Right." _Oh for the love of he already made a Sicilian chapter of the Disciplinary Committee._ "Uh, how many people has he recruited into his…committee?"

"Uh…the last I knew, sixteen. The other night, he rolled through, took over control of the Via Grotta Snakes. Told us to keep the peace and not to crowd, used those steel pipes of his to beat the shit outta anyone who tried to argue."

"They're tonfas," Tsuna said, and groaned. "Uh…thanks. I guess. Sorry, what's your name?"

"Rico, sir, I was named lieutenant on account of the fact that I'm the only one that speaks any Japanese. My dad thought I was going to be an engineer," he said, with a snort.

"Please don't call me sir, just call me Tsuna. I'm sorry if Hibari hurt any of you guys, I didn't think he'd spend his first few days in Italy establishing discipline." _I don't know why I didn't expect that…_ "Where's he…I guess, does he have a base here in Palermo?"

"Ah—at the moment, none that I know of. In truth, most of us have met him only once, and he contacts me only by phone."

 _At least back home you can usually find him in the Reception Room._ "Right. Thanks. Oh, before you go, can I get your phone number? In case I need to find Hibari?"

The high school boy scribbled down his number on a piece of hotel stationary, and scampered off just in case Tsuna was as dangerous as Hibari. Tsuna threw the door shut and stuffed the phone number away. _Invitation, invitation…oh, right, that thing. Maybe this time it'll actually be the Ninth waiting for us in this field trip to the countryside._

* * *

'Us' was a deceptive description. Gokudera was spending the day being educated in the duties of a right-hand by the Ninth Cloud Guardian, Visconti. Lambo was visiting the Bovino Family—Tsuna had suggested it, when it was apparent that he wasn't exactly welcome on the trip. Hibari was putting together his gang or Foundation or whatever he was choosing to call it. Ryohei was putting himself through torture—that is, he was meeting with Varia's Sun, Lussuria, for training. That left Yamamoto and Chrome to accompany Tsuna.

The field trip to the country was requested by the Ninth, and while Tsuna wasn't exactly sure where they were going, he was fairly certain it wasn't to the Vongola's headquarters, which was a castle in the Sicilian countryside, at least judging by the vague descriptions of it.

The car ride was long and quiet. Chrome had suggested going with formalwear again, although they had similar personal touches as the other day—Tsuna had his tuna fish cufflinks, Chrome had her skull pins, and Yamamoto had stuck some unnecessary bandages on his cheek and hands, and wore the Vongola Gear of the Rain visibly around his neck instead of tucking it into a pocket as he usually did. And unlike the other day, each of them had their weapons on their person—Yamamoto had a case on his back for the Shigure Kintoki, Chrome had her spear in its collapsed form on her belt, and Tsuna wore the mitten form of the X-Gloves.

* * *

Highways, byways, lanes, dirt roads in the woods. The drive took them along the northern coastline at first, further east then inland.

"Nobody's been down this way in a while, it seems," Yamamoto commented. "Or at least it's supposed to seem that way. You know anything about where it is we're going, Jack?"

"I know little, I haven't been out this way before. Judging by the map, if you had a straight shot it'd be around or even under a half an hour from here to the city of Renatti, but going entirely by the roads it's nearly two hours. Remote, but less so than that of other families, there's some apparently so deep in the countryside you can only reach them by horseback."

At the end of the road, another black car was already parked. The Ninth Mist Guardian, Bouche Croquant, leaned against the car and stood meditatively, although he smiled as Tsuna stepped out of the car.

"Decimo, a pleasure to see you, as always," he said. His deep voice had a heavy timbre. "I hope your visit has been pleasant thus far?"

"It's been interesting, sir," Tsuna said, as he approached. "Uh…how are you?"

"I am well, thank you." He glanced over his shoulder to the line of foliage at the end of the road. "The path to the villa is disguised, one moment and I can lift the mist."

He didn't get that far—Yamamoto and Chrome both walked right through the illusory image crossing the path, seeming to vanish at they stepped through. Tsuna gave him an apologetic look, then went after them without any trouble from the still image. That the image was completely still, when there was a distinct wind rustling the trees around the path, was the first and biggest hint that it was just an illusion.

Beyond Bouche Croquant, the dirt path became cobblestone, and quickly widened. The foliage thinned, and a brick and mortar manor rose up before them. A few stories tall, long and wide, with walkways placed here and there leading to a fountain courtyard.

Tsuna was the first to recognize it. "This was the First's! From the Inkwell and Oath Flame keys, it's the building where the Vongola was originally headquartered!"

Yamamoto whistled. "Neat to see in person, eh? Although, wasn't there a town here that whatever it was, hundred, hundred fifty years ago?"

"Indeed," called the voice of an old man, standing at the grand front door. "There was a town here, which grew up around old headquarters—this place, now called 'Giotto's Villa'. However, after the First retired and passed on the rings to his successor, the Second moved the Vongola's headquarters to a more defensible location, what is now called the Iron Fortress. The houses decayed, and the Villa as well. It was on the verge of falling apart when my mother ordered that it be restored to keep that old memory alive."

"Grandpa!" Tsuna shouted out, and went bright red at the instinctive reaction. Yamamoto laughed out loud, while Chrome smiled.

"Come, Tsunayoshi-kun, we have much to discuss," said the Ninth, smiling pleasantly. He carried his scepter, using it as a cane, but stood quite firmly even so. His Lightning and Rain Guardians stood at each shoulder, but moved away when Tsuna approached. Schnitten Brabanters took up a patrol around the outside of the building, while Ganauche opened the door for the Ninth and Tsuna. Tsuna looked over at his friends.

"I'm gonna take a look around outside," Yamamoto said.

Chrome was silent as she walked away, but Mukurowl was quickly on her shoulder and then he was flying off to get the lay of the land.

Tsuna stepped in after the Ninth, and the door was shut behind them. The inside of the villa was musty and dusty and quiet. The little furniture there was, was covered in tarps. Unfaded squares of wallpaper indicated where paintings had once hung.

"It feel like an old haunted house," Tsuna said, a little deflated.

"Well, it's been kept together, that doesn't mean it's been inhabited," the Ninth admitted.

"So…you said, your mother?"

"Vongola Ottavo, yes," said Timoteo. His eyes became sad as he seemed to look at something far off. "Daniela was her name, a strong woman equally known for her beauty, compassion, and ruthlessness. Or, so I'm told. She passed away thirty, thirty-five years ago? Complications of tuberculosis-it was a long time coming."

"I'm sorry."

He sighed. "It's been a long time since then, and I've had plenty to think of in the meantime." He led Tsuna upstairs, to a small office that looked out over the front of the villa to the south. Everything was covered in a fine layer of dust, and it seemed more like a museum display than a living room. Empty glass cases sat on each side of the room, and empty bookshelves were nailed to the walls.

The Ninth ran his fingertips over the lid of one of the cases, and made a face at the dust that came off. "At one time, several artifacts from the first generation were kept here. The First Boss's I-Gloves, although in their inactive form they took the form of a set of rings, the first Storm Guardian's Bow, and a cross-shaped pendant worn by the first Sun Guardian, although during the restoration they were moved to a vault in our present headquarters."

Tsuna had his hand clenched so tightly his knuckles were turning white. _Aaagh just ask him! But clearly he wants to talk about the past—wait, unless he's talking about the past to keep me from bringing it up?_ He spoke before he could talk himself out of it. "Ninth—why did you trick all of us the first night in Italy?"

The Ninth looked at Tsuna over his shoulder, and Tsuna nearly broke something when he saw that the Ninth was smiling. "I was interested in seeing how you would react to being put off-balance."

"I—I don't—you did—off balance?" he sputtered. "I was worried I was going to start a gang war, and me and my friends being really really jet-lagged didn't help at all! Yamamoto could barely keep his head up, and the only reason Gokudera didn't pass out was because he was too terrified of the Giegue, and Lambo was asleep through the entire meal! What was that supposed to prove?"

"You're not always going to be in the best of situations, Tsunayoshi. You need to learn that—although, from what I heard, you did quite well, keeping aware and speaking diplomatically to Giegiov the entire time." The Ninth tapped his fingertips against the head of his scepter. "If that was a test, you passed. Even if your Guardians were less engaged, it is less essential that they be leaders, as such, as much as bodyguards."

Tsuna stepped in front of the Ninth to look him in the eye. "They're my _friends,_ before anything else. Don't talk about them as though they're just…just…hitmen here for a paycheck!" The Ninth met his gaze, and looked away.

Still not looking at Tsuna, the Ninth said "Perhaps I did go too far. I'm sorry, for how I referred to your Guardians, and for deceiving you. It won't happen again."

Tsuna was taken aback at how quickly he relented, but any more he knew when somebody was lying—whether it was genuinely just a gut feeling, or unconsciously picking up on somebody flushing red or doing a nervous tic, he didn't know, but it was all the same, and the Ninth wasn't lying about being sorry. "Thank you."

"May I continue to speak to you? Or would you like to leave?"

"No, go ahead." Tsuna backed off, stepping across the room to give the old man some space.

"Thank you." He put a hand to his chin, and closed his eyes for a moment to collect his thoughts. "Do you maintain your position regarding the succession?"

"Yes," Tsuna said, without a moment of hesitation. "Whether it's Decimo, or Neo Primo—I'm not interested."

The Ninth smiled again, but this time it seemed genuinely amused. "Neo Primo?"

Tsuna went red when he realized what he was implying. "…That is, Reborn—"

"Oh, of course. Don't worry, I understand completely if he was involved. 'Vongola Neo Primo', indeed."

Tsuna squinted. "Ninth—was Reborn your tutor, too?"

"Oh, no, certainly not!" He seemed a little perturbed at the idea. "He was only a child when I was being mentored."

… _He's still 'only' a child,_ Tsuna thought, but he would in retrospect be glad he didn't voice the thought.

"He's just been involved with the family for a long while now, and I've come to understand how he thinks, to a certain degree at any rate.

… _A long while, and just now is he starting to understand Reborn. I'm screwed!_

"Moving on, then. The next thing I wanted to discuss with you concerns this villa. Its ownership is a tricky thing. It was the Primo's property, in those days, and by all rights should have passed through his family line. While he had one son in Italy, the boy, my namesake, had no children. His second son, Yoshimune Sawada, would have inherited it, following then his lineage, but while he was aware of his father's business, he put the estate in the hands of his Italian cousin. The status quo was maintained through the generations, but it still remains that the villa is, by right of inheritance, yours."

Tsuna's eyes widened, and he looked to the desk. He set his hand on the surface. "Seriously?"

"Indeed. Naturally, I can arrange for the annual maintenance—consider it a few years of Christmas gifts—or if you wish, it can be arranged to keep the estate in the hands of the Vongola. Or, you could sell it to the family, and it would be used thereafter as a secondary headquarters. Ah, tertiary, but the point still stands."

Tsuna looked at the windowsill, and in his mind's eye he saw a tiny mechanical beetle alight with Earth Flame. _If Reborn and the Ninth and my dad have anything to say about it, this won't be my last trip to Italy._ "Sure—I mean, I'll take it, yeah. If I—who am I kidding, when I—get pulled back to Italy again, it'd be nice to have something like a home to come to. And with somebody staying in it, even just occasionally, I think it would really bring it back to life. Hey, there's enough rooms, could invite some of the others to come visit. Heh, I'm starting to understand how Enma and his friends felt about Cozarto Manor."

The Ninth was smiling. Tsuna went red when he realized how he had been talking. The Ninth just nodded, and continued. "Very well, then. I'll ensure the paperwork is done properly, but for now," he said, and produced a housekey on a carabiner. Tsuna took it and set it in his pocket next to the Dying Will Pills.

"Moving on, then, to the next order of business; a more personal matter. To get straight to the point, a little bird told me that your mother, lovely woman as I recall, was looking at adopting your Guardian of Lightning, Lambo?"

Tsuna froze, looked from the Ninth, to the floor, put his palm to his forehead, and before he could stop himself he said "A little bird told you? Was it a meddling little crow who makes everything his business even if it has nothing to do with him?" He threw his hands up in defeat and started walking in circles. "Yeah, yeah, she is. What about it?"

The Ninth took a moment to answer, as he tried to regain his composure after Tsuna's sudden outburst. "Ah, yes, well." He cleared his throat and straightened. "That is, I'm very happy to hear about it. It's unfortunately far too common to try and create child soldiers; I suspect that it is done in imitation of the Arcobaleno, in a fundamental misunderstanding of their nature. I think it will be very good for the boy to have the chance to grow up in something as near to normal as we can find in this world."

"There are four hitmen living under my mother's roof."

"As I said, as near to normal as we can manage. My point is, unfortunately, it is prohibitively difficult to adopt an Italian national, and even more difficult for a non-Italian couple to attempt it. Even with all the points in their favor, being married for several years with one child already and the prospective adoptee having lived with your mother for a few years, the bureaucracy is going to hold it up. It could be years, without intervention."

"But that's not fair—wait. Intervention?" Tsuna said slowly, as his heart sank at the expectations.

He was, after all, still speaking to the Don Vongola.

"I have quite a bit of influence, and I've made some calls to some friends, and the adoption process is going to be significantly streamlined," the Ninth said casually. "It's the least I can do."

"That's…nice of you." _Just speak out loud, stupid! Remember what Giegiov said, don't play word games!_ "What are you expecting in return?"

"Nothing, Tsunayoshi. I only want to help ease the process."

He wasn't lying, but Tsuna still didn't believe a word he said. _He's a Don! That's the thing with mafia, right? They do something nice once and then you owe them forever!_

"But," the Ninth said, sighing. "I imagine you don't believe me when I say that. Particularly after the gambit I pulled when you first came. Am I right?"

Tsuna reluctantly nodded. _Then again, he has the same Hyper Intuition, doesn't he? I didn't notice it when we met, before the Inheritance Ceremony, but it's like an aura—dad has the same, even if it's a lot weaker._

"I've made the call, already, and should be hearing back about a timeframe within the next day. It will be under a year, I am assured, and until then Lambo will be allowed to continue living in the home."

"I don't want to owe you."

The Ninth raised an eyebrow.

"All these people keep on talking about debts they owe. The last thing I want is to make somebody think I'm doing something just because I want them to owe me, and I know what kind of trouble you can get in for being in debt to somebody."

"Fair enough. You've become wise, Tsunayoshi. I thought you might feel that way, and prepared a job that would repay any perceived 'debt'."

It took Tsuna a moment to register what the Ninth said. _Did he plan this from the start? Oh god please don't be a hit please don't be a hit._

From the pocket of his jacket, the Ninth retrieved a letter marked with an unfamiliar insignia, and offered it to Tsuna. Still slightly stunned, Tsuna took it and unfolded the page. "Uh…I'm still not the best at reading Italian…"

"Unimportant. Tsunayoshi-kun, I'm told that recently you met one former associate of the Carcassa Family, is that correct?"

"Uh…yeah, Skull. He asked me to help him prove he didn't betray the Carcassa."

"And you're aware of the type of work that the Carcassa dealt in?"

"They dealt drugs, right?"

"Correct. Generally, most families with even a bare sense of keeping their territory at peace try to keep drug deals out of the territory. It breeds chaos and pain to allow such activity. However, the Carcassa bosses have always had looser morals, and indeed the family was one of the largest drug cartels in all of Europe, with fingers in Germany, France, Switzerland, what have you. Then, they were betrayed to the police, and the organization fell apart overnight."

"Okay, sounds like a good thing to me," Tsuna said. "I mean, fewer illegal drugs on the streets, the better of it is, right?"

"In theory, perhaps so, but in practice, the Carcassa falling apart may have created more problems than it solved."

"They literally set people on fire when they didn't need them any more."

"Perhaps, but they also edged any competition out of the market. With the Carcassa gone, there is now a wide-open market, being filled by petty criminals who sow chaos and discord."

 _From the sound of it, things weren't much better under the Carcassa._ "Is that everywhere?"

"Hm?"

"I mean, is that all across Europe, or just in Italy? I haven't heard anything about petty drug gangs coming up in France and Switzerland, and I've been paying pretty good attention to the news lately…uh…"

The Ninth was smiling at Tsuna. "And that, Tsunayoshi, is why I believe you are the person best suited to returning the Vongola to its former glory. Indeed, you're correct, the major plague has been in Italy, and the destruction of the Carcassa was, on a wider perspective, a good thing. Forgive me, I'm a bit short-sighted."

"No no no, I didn't mean it like that!"

The Ninth continued on despite his protests. "One such petty gang is dealing in the territory of the Trad 6 Famiglia. However, they are believed to be based out of shipping yards in Vongola territory. Accordingly, Signora Giralia of the Trad 6 requested permission to enter Vongola territory to clear out the gang, but have done little more than gathering information since the request was made a week ago. Since then, one of their weapons designers living in Palermo, a man named Koenig, has gone missing, with a note implying that if they wished to guarantee his safety that they stay out of the gang's territory."

Tsuna narrowed his brow. "Koenig, Koenig, where have I heard that before…hold on, isn't that one of the guys working on designing box weapons?"

"Is he? I wouldn't know," the Ninth said, although that seemed to catch his attention. "The point being, that Signora Giralia has asked for aid in clearing the gang out and retrieving Koenig from their base."

 _Clearing out a drug gang and rescuing a hostage? That sounds…a lot better than what it could have been. Although…_ "I…when you say, 'clear out', what do you mean?"

"By whatever methods you deem appropriate. I won't deny it, I'm curious to see how you handle a job through entirely your own leadership."

"Right…" _Well, it's better than the last test of my abilities._

* * *

As Tsuna spoke with the Ninth inside Giotto's Villa, Yamamoto had meandered into the courtyard in the center of the building. There were hedges short enough to step over that had grown out unevenly, with piles of dead leaves collecting beneath them. The gravel path was beaten down from ages of footsteps and needed a fresh layer put down. A long-dry fountain sat in the middle of the garden where the paths met. The shape of a flame carved from stone rose from the center of the fountain. The edge of the basin was wide enough to sit on comfortably.

"Huh," Yamamoto said, as he walked around the base of the fountain looking for any indication of the water supply. "Hm." He looked around the courtyard after finding no visible pipes. There was an electrical meter on the wall next to the archway he had passed under to enter the courtyard, and there was a balcony on the second floor that looked out over the courtyard. He used his foot to push away a branch of one of the shrubs and found a round valve connected to a pipe. "Aha!" He knelt down, took a strong grip on the handle, and turned it.

The rusty handle broke away from the valve. Yamamoto shoved the broken handle away in his pocket, and stood up quickly. _Oops._

"I'm telling boss."

Yamamoto whipped around, still bright red, and was reading to start pleading until he saw the mischievous smile on Chrome's lips. He laughed aloud. "In my defense, it was super-rusty. Plus, you wouldn't dare tell Tsuna, any more stress and he's liable to have a stroke." _Not that I can really blame him for being anxious…_

"Everything's rusty. But I like it." She walked down the path as she spoke. "There's a studio on the second floor. I could nearly hear the sound of a wooden flute on the breeze coming through the window. You might feel it, too."

"Oh, I doubt it, that stuff is just like horo-horo to me," Yamamoto said breezily. He didn't seem to notice that Chrome didn't understand what he meant. "But I really wish I could get this fountain to work. Oh, I got an idea!" He held his Vongola Gear lightly between his fingers and said "Jirou! Kojirou!"

In two masses of rain flames came an Akita Inu with armor on its shoulders and a Swallow with a crest on its forehead. Jirou immediately set to licking Yamamoto furiously, and through his laughter he set Kojirou on the top of the fountain. Kojirou flicked her wings, preened a bit, and lit up with low-density Rain Flames that sprayed out like water.

"Who's a good boy? Who's a good puppy?" Yamamoto said, scratching Jirou behind the ears and on his belly. "C'mon, you want to take a break from that harness?"

"Takeshi," Chrome said lightly.

"Yeah?" He took a moment to look up from petting Jirou, and only continued in doing so as he greeted his Ninth Generation counterpart. "Yo."

Schnitten Brabanters looked Yamamoto up and down. The Ninth Gen Rain Guardian really was not that old, and for all his scars he was very healthy. He wore his jacket unbuttoned, his tie loosely, and his hair gelled back, much to the eternal chagrin of his coworkers. He turned his gaze to the Rain Akita. "What an interesting creature. May I?"

"Yeah, go ahead, Jirou's super-friendly," Yamamoto said. Brabanters stepped forward with his hand outstretched, and patted Jirou on the top of the head. Jirou twisted up to lick his hand. Yamamoto laughed. "That means he likes you."

"He licks everyone," Chrome muttered.

"That's cause he likes everyone," he said with a grin.

Brabanters nodded. "A loyal hound is fitting for a man sworn to the Tenth Boss of Vongola."

The sun was shining, but the temperature suddenly seemed to drop a few degrees. Yamamoto was still smiling as he said "Technically, Akitas aren't hounds. I looked it up, most kennel clubs categorize them as working dogs. And I'm not a hound, either. Sir," he added, pointedly.

"What are you to Tsunayoshi Sawada, then?"

"His right hand."

"Hm. That Smokin' Bomb might have a few words to say about that."

"More than a few."

He was still smiling, even as Brabanters was frowning. When Yamamoto stood, he was a full inch taller than Brabanters. Brabanters broke away his gaze. "It's quite unfortunate that you were indisposed during the Inheritance Ceremony. I'm told you're a swordsman, and I'm always eager to see another's work."

Yamamoto's eyes lit up. "I could give you a demonstration, if you like. I have my sword on me, and this area is big enough. The stonework and shrubs won't be damaged, unless I will it."

Brabanters stepped back and gestured for Yamamoto to continue. Yamamoto turned to grab his sword from where he had set it against the edge of the fountain. With a single practiced movement, he pulled the Shigure Kintoki from the bag and brought it to bear. In the moment, the shinai transformed into a katana. Kojirou flew from her pedestal on the fountain and into the air overhead.

He ran himself through the eighth form slowly. "My father taught me the way of the sword, the style which is second to none and absolutely perfect, Shigure Soen Ryu. It is a style which transcends style." He breathed easily. _This feels right, more than anything else._

"Fascinating," Brabanters muttered.

Yamamoto stepped back, gripped the sword with both hands, and drove himself forward. "Shigure Soen Ryu First Form: Shajiku no Ame." _And then…_ He released his left hand from the grip, wrapping his left arm around his chest as he looped the blade around his body and crossing over his back from hip to shoulder, just in time to deflect a short sword aimed at his exposed back. _Shigure Soen Ryu Sixth Form: Tenki Ame_

 **天気雨**

"Perceptive," Brabanters said, holding a wide short sword in each hand, with one held stiffly against Yamamoto's guarding blade. He dropped back a step.

Yamamoto returned to the basic stance and turned to look at Brabanters just out of the corner of his eye. "What kind of dishonorable man strikes while his opponent's back is turned, eh?" Yamamoto said. He was still smiling.

Chrome watched impassively. "Takeshi—do you want me to intercede?"

"Ha-ha. Nah, Chrome, but thanks for the offer," he said, as he cracked his neck. She nodded, and took a seat on the edge of the fountain. "Those swords of yours…they're called 'Cinquedeas', yeah?" _I'll have to be sure to thank that guy._

"Well read, for a baseball player," Brabanters said. It was probably supposed to be an insult.

"Nah, just a lucky guess." Yamamoto laughed and flicked his sword hand. The katana shifted back into the form of a shinai.

"What kind of man backs down from a challenge?" Brabanters said.

Yamamoto smiled, and there was a ferocity in his eyes that hadn't been there a moment before. Brabranters' didn't know that intensity, but Yamamoto's fellow Guardians did—it was the same look as when he had fought Genkishi for the second time, and when he had promised to cut down Daemon Spade. "I guess you don't realize it yet, do you?"

"Eh?"

"You've lost already." The Rain Swallow landed on Yamamoto's shoulder.

"What are you—" Brabanters went to take a step forward, and his legs didn't respond right. Without realizing it, all of the strength had left his arms. "How?"

"The property of Rain Flames, expressed through a Box Weapon, of Tranquility. From the moment you went for my back—no, from the moment you considered it, Kojirou rained down Tranquilizing Flames. Don't feel too bad about it—that's a trick that really only works once, after all. It should wear off in a minute or so."

Brabanters carefully slid his short swords into the scabbards on his back, hidden just beneath his loose suit jacket. He tried to shake out the numb feeling in his arms. "I should take my leave, I believe the Ninth is just finishing with Tsunayoshi Sawada."

Yamamoto narrowed his eyes as his counterpart limped away, still numb. _A loyal hound…_ "Chrome, don't mention this to Tsuna, yeah? He's got enough to worry about."

"Alright," she said uncertainly, acutely aware of the troubled look on Yamamoto's face.

* * *

 _Culture Notes_

 _Shigure Soen Ryu: Tenki Ame_ 天気雨 _\- derived from the Japanese phrase meaning a sunshower, rain which comes out of a clear blue sky._

 _Horo-Horo-the Japanese pronunciation of the word 'hollow' like_ ホロホロ _, alluding to the ghostly air in the room in Yamamoto's own way of describing things particularly back during the Daily Life arc._

* * *

 _A/N:_ _I wanted to give a big big thank you to every reader, I'm enjoying writing this a whole lot and it only encourages me even more every time my phone buzzes with an alert saying somebody's favorited or followed or reviewed._

 _Next time...double length chapter? Double length chapter! A Samurai and his Daimyo? Target 14: The First Job!_


	14. The First Job

_A/N: Double-length chapter! And by that, I mean nearly triple-length chapter because the second part goes on so long. Call it reader appreciation, I love you guys all so much._

 _Also, something to note in regards to Chapter 13: Giotto's Villa. I got a few reviews in regards to my choice to switch up the family tree so that Daniela was Timoteo's sister, and thus I have edited it such that Daniela is again Timoteo's mother, because that was pretty BS in retrospect._

 _Big thanks to wyrvel for helping me out with that, also helped resolved some thoughts on the story timeline as well as how to make later developments here a bit more engaging. If you have not read their 'Dead-Eyed Tsuna', I heartily recommend it, you can find it under the 'favorites' section on my profile._

 **Chapter 14: The First Job Part 1: The Plan**

Tsuna was no sooner than opening the door to his hotel room when he was being assaulted with pizza and some type of fried Sicilian rice ball that Ryohei Sasagawa called an 'ara-n-sini', and Gokudera immediately and angrily corrected his pronunciation of 'arancine'. Expecting the filling to be fish or vegetables, Tsuna managed to spill the tomato sauce filling all down his chin when he took a big bite of it.

"A-gha-fu," he said, through the mouthful of food. He wiped off his face, swallowed the rest of the bite, and said "It's good!"

"Hmph, not bad, Lawn-Head," Gokudera said, giving Ryohei the side-eye as he did so. He went for a slice of Sicilian pizza covered in tomato slices, basil, and sausage. "Nothing in the world like it."

"This was your idea, Ryohei?"

"Yup!" Ryohei said cheerfully, from his seat on Tsuna's bed. "Now eat, Sawada! You've been eating poorly, to the extreme! You won't be in good condition if you don't eat enough! Oi, Yamamoto! Get a piece!"

Yamamoto glanced over, said "Oh, uh, thanks", but didn't take a piece before sitting down on the floor with his legs crossed.

Lambo grabbed his second piece of pizza, which was nothing compared to Chrome being on her fourth already—although the boy were all classy enough to not mention it even if they had noticed—and Reborn on his fifth. Which was really amazing considering that he had entered only after Tsuna, without anyone really noticing.

"So what in the world are you doing during the day?" Tsuna said suspiciously.

"Burying bodies," Reborn said.

"Isn't that the kind of thing you do at night?"

"Only if you want to attract attention."

"I'm pretty sure you'd attract _more_ attention dumping a body in broad daylight."

"Then the next time you kill someone, you can decide when and where to bury the body."

"Why would I bother burying the body? I'm a living crematorium!"

Yamamoto, Ryohei, and Chrome were staring at Tsuna. It was mostly for the last comment, but the discussion before it had caught their attention as well. Tsuna went red. "It was…I'm pretty sure he wasn't actually burying bodies today…"

Gokudera tsked at them. "It was a joke, obviously. Besides, Tenth, if it ever came to it, I would take care of the body for you, to reduce the risk of you being connected to the crime."

Tsuna stared at his slice of pizza. "Oh god I'm spending way too much time around weird people."

"The great Lambo will make it all go boom!" Lambo shouted out.

"Stupid cow, that just increases the chance of leaving evidence!"

"Make it aaall go boom!"

"So how'd that field trip go?" Ryohei said quickly, before Lambo started making things go boom in the middle of downtown Palermo.

"Uh…" Tsuna averted his eyes. "It was…okay. We met the Ninth and some of his Guardians at the first headquarters of the Vongola—you know, that mansion from the Keys? It's called Giotto's Villa. It's dusty, and a little lifeless, but it's also passed down—well, it's not inheritance like this inheritance." He pulled on the chain he kept around his neck that held the Sky Ring. "It's inheritance like normal inheritance, and so I guess that means I own a villa in the Sicilian countryside?"

"I wouldn't have thought that building was standing," Gokudera said.

"It's standing, but that's about all it's doing."

"The water pipes need replaced," Yamamoto said. He was looking away from Tsuna, to the window on the far side of the room.

"O-oh? Yeah, I guess that's kind of important, too." Tsuna scratched the back of his head. "He asked me if I had changed my mind, and I haven't."

Nobody asked him to clarify what he meant, and nobody needed clarification.

"Oh and apparently Vongola Neo Primo is entirely made-up." He took another piece of pizza, and glared at Reborn out of the corner of his eye. "Speaking of manipulative, lying crows…"

"Crows?" Chrome said.

"Uh, the Ninth said something about a little bird told him, and I kinda got a little…anyways," Tsuna said, rapidly turning red.

He told them about the Ninth's interference with the adoption process so that it would go more smoothly—Lambo's reaction to the mention of it was, as it had been since being asked if he would like to be adopted, to bounce up and down in his seat, smile big, and say "mamma" dreamily.

When Tsuna brought up the job request from the Trad 6, Gokudera had instantly jumped up, ran to his room to get his laptop, and came back with a map of Palermo and its outlying districts open on the screen. "Naturally, Tenth, I will follow your every order to the word!"

"Wait, no, Gokudera, I don't want you to help me, it's my problem!" He rubbed his forehead. "I mean, I don't mean I don't want your help, but this isn't like the battle in the future where it was so much bigger, or against Enma and his family where it was personal. I'll go find these guys, destroy their stockpile, and scare them off."

"As your tutor, I can't allow it," Reborn said. "I'll shoot you in the leg before I let you go into a dangerous situation alone."

"But I don't want my friends to get hurt over something that's my problem to deal with! If I get hurt, so what?"

Gokudera dropped the laptop, and grabbed Tsuna by the shoulder. "Tenth—isn't that what we're fighting for?"

"Huh?"

Gokudera hesitated, and started again. "To have snowball fights and watch fireworks—so that everyone can laugh together?" He suddenly seemed to become aware of himself, and drew his hand back. "I'm so sorry, Tenth—but is it that different?"

 _To laugh together?_

Tsuna's mind snapped to an old memory, just about one year earlier, of explosions rocking the school and Prince the Ripper versus Smoking Bomb.

"I believe you can do it alone—but if you have others with you, it'll be easier and less chance of injury, right?" There was a desperation in his eyes. Maybe he was just trying to come up with an excuse to stay by Tsuna's side.

"…right. Right, okay. Um…and now that I think about it, it sounds like the gang is holed up in a warehouse, so that means plenty of obstacles for you, right?"

Gokudera's eyes widened, and he coughed, and picked up his laptop again. He nodded, and said "Yes, Tenth, it does work better in places like that. Uh, dynamite, I mean. I mean, the Vongola Gear helped make up for that weakness, as long as I can place catnip I can get a direct hit, but…"

"Okay, so that's me and you," Tsuna said, driving right on ahead to try and keep Gokudera from having a breakdown when he realized how he had talked to his boss. "Don't know exactly where they're holed up, though. But—I think I might have an idea of how to hunt them down. And speaking of, can we leave a little food leftover? I want to take some to Hibari. He's been making the Sicilian Branch of the Disciplinary Committee, and they're all locals—I bet they could find some information about the gang."

"I can talk to Hibari!" Ryohei said enthusiastically. "He can't say no to me!"

 _More like he won't let Hibari say no to him._ "Thanks, Ryohei."

"Tenth, if I may," Gokudera said. "I believe that a squad of three is optimal for such a job. The sociological—uh, I'll save the details for later. But, if you insist on going, then it would be you, myself, and as much as I hate to admit it." And he did, his teeth were ground together from the strain. "Yamamoto's focus on short-range compliments my mid-range well."

"Sorry, I'll have to take the bench on this one," Yamamoto said, although he didn't sound very sorry.

"Oi, baseball idiot! You're going to—"

"Gokudera, it's fine! Nobody has to help! Alright? That goes for everyone." However, Tsuna looked over at Yamamoto. When Yamamoto realized it, he made a point of breaking eye contact and staring at the floor. Tsuna glanced at his Guardians in turn, and noted that Chrome had her arms pulled in and a look of concern on her face. _I'll talk to him later._ "Like you said, three. So, maybe, me, you, and Ryohei?"

"I could," Chrome said, and seemed to regret speaking up immediately. "I mean—I've gotten better at combat. And I can do a few things with illusions for support."

Tsuna nodded. "What do you think, Gokudera?"

"…Alright. That could work." Gokudera still seemed a little peeved at Yamamoto's refusal. "Uh…assuming their base is somewhere in this district up here." He pointed to the northwest portion of Palermo on the bay. "Generally best time would be night, of course." He started biting his nail. "Fewer people out, fewer _polizia_. And with Chrome, we can vanish right afterwards."

"Night's no good," Tsuna said. "My flames stand out against the night sky. What about right at dawn?"

Gokudera nodded. "Of course, Tenth, my apologies for my ignorance. Dawn would work, particularly on such a small situation—I've done similar jobs before, it's an in-and-out in five minutes sort."

"Alright," Tsuna said. "It'll be difficult to get that information on such short notice, so probably the morning of the 14th?" he said, uncertainly. Gokudera nodded. "Alright. Oh, and, I want to say it now. I know you guys. You're all like me, in regards to people, and, um…"

"Don't kill anyone?" Reborn suggested.

 _It's like he read my mind._ "I mean, I don't mean to imply anyone would! But…from the sounds of it, these guys are just small-time criminals, right? They're not…not…" _Byakuran._ "But at the same time, if something happens, if one of them pulls a gun…I don't mean you should hold back even when your own life is in danger, or when somebody else's life is in danger. At that point, it's whatever you feel right doing. I'm not a mafia boss, I'm not going to celebrate casual murder, but I won't try to pass judgement if you did it for a reason." Tsuna considered it for a moment. "And if I do ever try and judge like that, please, please punch me in the face."

Ryohei lit up at the mention of punching. "Got it, to the extreme!"

 _I knew I could depend on him for that._ "Alright. Sorry to get so serious."

"And we understand the rule and will follow it," Gokudera said, nodding. He closed his laptop back up. "Best get to work."

"I'll go talk to Hibari," Ryohei said.

"I'd like to practice my forms a little," Chrome said.

Yamamoto kept his gaze off of Tsuna, crossed his arms over his chest, and left the room, pausing only just long enough to hold the door for Chrome. He had left, but there was still a tension in the air. Ryohei went out next, and Gokudera grabbed Lambo, bowed to Tsuna, and stepped out, letting the door slam shut behind him.

"Did something happen at Giotto's Villa?" Reborn said, on their exit.

"I have no idea," Tsuna admitted. "Yamamoto and Chrome were exploring the grounds while I was talking with the Ninth, but after we finished the Ninth left immediately with his Guardians. I should go talk to him…"

"It seemed like it was you, specifically, he was trying to avoid engaging with."

"Really?" He considered how Yamamoto had kept looking away from him, had gone mostly silent after Tsuna's arrival, and that he had declined to be a part of the job when he was usually enthusiastic about anything. "I guess you're right. Then, I'll go talk to Chrome, she seemed like she uncomfortable—more than usual, I mean. But, I think I might wait until tomorrow. Give things a chance to cool down."

"Or to boil over," Reborn said. He shrugged. "Whatever you think is the best choice, _boss._ "

 _He's just trying to get a reaction out of me,_ but his stomach was still turning over from nerves.

* * *

The next morning on October 13th, Tsuna was awakened at 8:00 by the guy with the green Mohawk—Rico, if he remembered right. "Uh…"

"I was asked to inform you that we're working on find the requested location, but it shouldn't be difficult. Also—"

"How do you take your coffee?"

"I'm sorry?"

Tsuna threw the door open, gestured for Rico to come inside, and with a bit of minor fiddling started the miniature coffee maker up. Rico, meanwhile, was standing awkwardly, picking at his cuticles. The hotel room was relatively small, with only a single full-sized bed, a closet, a window looking over the street—Rico didn't know it, but the glass was bullet-proof—and a single small table with two chairs. It was not meant for multiple people to stay in, which made it all the more amazing that they had managed to fit seven people into the room to eat pizza the previous night, even for just an hour.

"How do you take your coffee?" Tsuna said again.

"Black is fine."

Tsuna poured two mugs, the only two mugs in the room, and added a generous amount of sweetener and creamer to his own. "Sit."

Rico obeyed, and nodded his thanks when Tsuna passed him the coffee.

Tsuna sat down, took a deep breath, and took a big swallow of coffee. He made a face at the bitterness, and smacked his own cheek. "Sorry. I'm used to tea. Also, sorry if I seem a little out of it. I didn't get a lot of sleep last night." That was a lie, he had gotten sleep, but it had been restless and plagued by nightmares he couldn't remember.

"It's fine, sir, really," Rico said. "Thank you for your kindness."

"Also, you really don't have to call me 'sir', I'm younger than you anyways."

"Right. Um, so, sir," he said, plowing right on ahead. "I wanted to mention that if it's the same gang that's been making trouble around here lately, they've got some decent numbers, and even at 5 AM they'll have some guys on guard."

"Guessed as much. What else?"

"Well—the Captain has put me in charge of setting up a perimeter around the building during the operation tomorrow morning, although he was a bit vague as to the purpose."

Tsuna tilted his head to the side. "If I had to guess, probably to enable easier biting to death. At least, that's why he has the disciplinary committee back home make a perimeter, so he doesn't have to spend as much time chasing people down. But! I'm not overruling, but we're not looking to…hurt these dealers, necessarily? Scare them away, threaten them into stopping their business, destroying their stockpile and equipment yes, but there are people who deserve lethal force in this world, and some drug dealers aren't included in that list."

"You're not that kind of man?" Rico said, and gave just a hint of a smile.

"You talked to Ryohei?"

"Uh, more like he was shouting at the captain, but yeah."

"Well…okay, that's not the kind of man I am, I guess." If Tsuna were asked specifically what kind of man he was, he would reply that he was only a boy, but that was beside the point. "What I'll want you and the others to do is make sure that no civilians get inside that perimeter. Given that it's so early, I don't think it'll be a problem, but better safe than sorry."

"We can do that, sir," Rico said. He shook his head, smiling. "Man, I told these guys they were full of shit when they said you were Vongola." He laughed, until he saw the serious look on Tsuna's face. "Wait, you're not…"

"If I have any say in the matter, then no," Tsuna said. "But I'm not doing what I am for the Vongola. It's for my friends, and my family—I mean, not The Family, but my mom, and Lambo. And I wouldn't be doing _this_ job, specifically, if I thought it would go against my principles."

" _Merda_. Sir, uh, V-Vongola? Sorry."

"Tsuna, or Sawada if you have to."

"Sawada, then. Uh…good luck, then. We could use somebody with a conscience around this city," Rico said, nodding. With his report done and another reassurance that they would find the location of the drug gang, Tsuna let him go on his business.

* * *

With that done, Tsuna got himself dressed, walked down the hall from his room, took a deep breath, and knocked on the door. There was no reply.

"Yamamoto? Gokudera?" Nothing. Only Tsuna and Chrome had hotel rooms of their own—Gokudera and Yamamoto had been put together in one, while Ryohei was theoretically bunking with Hibari, but with the prefect doing his own business, he'd had the room to himself, and Lambo had claimed the empty full-sized bed for himself.

He had been about to walk away, when he saw a shadow move from under the door. "Yamamoto? It's Tsuna. Can we talk?"

There was a long pause, and Tsuna was just about to walk away when he heard the approaching sound of footsteps on the wooden floor. The door came open, and Yamamoto appeared in the doorway. His eyes were heavy from lack of sleep, and he wasn't even pretending to be his usual cheery self. It wasn't like when he became serious in a fight, focusing on the moment at hand. He just looked tired, and maybe a little angry, and a little…desperate.

"Yeah?" Yamamoto said, breaking Tsuna out of the trance as he looked over his friend.

"I…I just wanted to make sure you were okay. You seemed a little out of it."

"I'm fine."

"Did something happen yesterday? At the villa, or did you get a call from your dad?"

"I said, I'm _fine._ " He flexed the fingers of his right hand, as though reaching for a sword that wasn't there.

Tsuna thought of what Reborn said, about how Yamamoto seemed to be avoiding speaking to him. _Normally, I'd try to push past that, but I get the feeling that might just do more harm than good._ "Alright; I'll get out of your way, then."

"Geez, worse than the kid," Yamamoto muttered, and slammed the door shut.

 _So Reborn stopped by here, too? Not exactly surprising, he's been invested in Yamamoto's development since day one._ There was something wrong, certainly; the last time Yamamoto had been so down was after Choice, when he thought it was his fault they had lost. And he hadn't been nearly so antisocial, then. _I hate seeing Yamamoto this way. He's despairing, but I don't know anything about what's going on or what caused this, and he isn't being open about it either. I need more information if I want to help him._

Chrome was not in her room, but she had left a small note at the bottom of the door. _Upstairs, practicing._

The only 'upstairs' was the roof. He almost wasn't surprised to find Chrome sparring with Hibari. He didn't appear to be impressed by her combat ability, probably mentally comparing her to Mukuro Rokudo. That didn't mean he was pulling his punches.

Hibari expertly flipped one tonfa through his grip, grabbed it at the long end, and used the handle to hook Chrome's spear between her hands and yank it away. Without pausing, she threw her arms up over her upper body and took the incoming strike across her body without flinching. She dropped low, went under his arm, and grabbed her spear from where it had fallen as she turned. She lunged forward, only for Hibari to deflect the strike with a nearly lazy swing. He feinted to the left, went to the right, and landed a strike on the side of her abdomen strong enough to knock Chrome completely off her feet.

She pushed herself up, a little wobbly, and took her spear back in hand. "Thank you, Kyouya," she said quietly, and bowed as one would to a teacher.

"Hmph."

Chrome nodded, and walked over to Tsuna as Hibari got a drink of water. Tsuna smiled. "You're looking great, Chrome."

"Thank you, boss. Did you need to speak to me?"

Tsuna nodded, and said "I'm sorry, it's a little depressing, but, I have to ask, did anything weird happen at the villa yesterday? I'm worried about Yamamoto, it doesn't seem like he slept last night, he was being really quiet yesterday, it's like, like, he's in despair about something, but he won't say if something's wrong."

Chrome's hands tightened around her spear. "I…I promised I wouldn't talk about it." Just as Tsuna was getting ready to come up with his best begging, she said "But I can't leave it, I'm worried too.

"When we were in the courtyard yesterday, the Ninth Rain Guardian came up to Takeshi and started speaking to him. Takeshi was playing with Jirou, and the Ninth Rain Guardian compared him to Jirou—he called Takeshi a hound, like he took action at your beck and call. I think the idea of being a hound working for its master might have disturbed him. And then the Ninth Rain Guardian tried to attack Takeshi, used his short sword to try and go for Takeshi's back while he was demonstrating his forms, and I think that threw him off some, too. If I'd known he would be like this, I would have said something sooner."

Tsuna nearly started screaming at the first mention of Schnitten Brabanters. _First the Ninth now this guy! It's like they have no idea how normal people behave! A hound?! Who says that?!_ He took a deep breath, and refocused on the problem at hand. "Don't worry about it. Thank you for telling me what happened. I…ugh."

"What is it?"

"I just…I don't think he'd let me talk to him long enough to really say anything, y'know? And he's isolating himself so much, I don't know if there's anyone who has all the information who could…" Tsuna froze at the thought that hit him. _It does sound like a swordsman's honor thing…but it's that guy…but it is_ him, _after all._ "I might have a thought, but I'll need to think it over whether it'll be worth it…"

* * *

The day passed without event. At about noon, Rico got in contact with Tsuna, having found the warehouse just off the water where the gang was hiding out. It would be simple enough, but Tsuna couldn't stop feeling anxious—about everything at once.

By 4:30 AM on October 14th, the disciplinary committee/Foundation was in position. Rico had been given a miniaturized police scanner (courtesy of Gokudera, nobody asked where it came from) and an earpiece in case something went wrong. Ryohei had found a position atop a container crane, and had made an excessive amount of jokes about how he really was the Sun now, looking down on everything—that had been entirely unintentional, Ryohei had been assigned as their 'eye in the sky' largely because he was the only one besides Tsuna who could reliably fly.

As sunrise approached, forecasted to be just about 5:45 AM, Tsuna was making last-minute checks while hidden within an illusion of a shipping container. Chrome was meditating in a standing position. Gokudera was nervously playing with a piece of unlit dynamite.

 _"Sun's about to come up,"_ Ryohei said over the radio. _"We're carrying on the legacy of the First, so get pumped up and do it!"_

Tsuna laughed when he realized what 'it' he meant. Tsuna put his hands on each of Gokudera and Chrome's shoulders, and pulled them into a huddle. Chrome was either really chill, or pretending to be chill to hide nerves. Gokudera was muttering about stupid rituals. Tsuna called it out. "Sawada! Gokudera! Dokuro! Fight-O!"

Tsuna released them, pulled on his gloves, and swallowed the Dying Will Pills. His Dying Will flame burst into existence, and he said into his radio "Let's go."

The sky was painted with red as the sun crept over the horizon. A shaped charge set on the side door blew, and the door was blasted inward.

From his observatory position in another building, Reborn nearly choked on his espresso. "Well, subtlety was never this generation's strong point."

* * *

 **Chapter 14: The First Job Part 2: The Raid**

Just as the Foundation had reported; twenty and thirty-somethings drawing a profit on misery. No more than ten present. And they weren't Mafiosi; they were two-bit gangsters eager to make a profit while imagining themselves to be something bigger. Thus, the gall to threaten a criminal empire like Trad 6, and the stupidity to work out of Vongola territory.

The guard in the side office had pulled his gun starting from when the door was blasted inward, but then he blinked, and the gun was red-hot and the barrel was _melting_ , and there was this kid with a narrowed brow and fists held like a prayer standing in front of him, holding the barrel of the guard's gun with burning hands. The kid was silent, but then there were two others beside him, and the guy said "Scream, and I'll beat the shit out of you."

"Y-yeah man, whatever you say."

"Where's the scientist?"

There was only one scientist that the guard knew of. "Staging room, go out this door, hang a left. We got him in a side room. Please, please don't kill me. I got family. I never was a dealer, I was just a guard."

"Fucking pathetic piece of work. Who's in charge?"

"I don't—" And then the guy produced a piece of _fucking dynamite_ , and gave a look that suggested he was oh-so-eager to make use of it. "Fuck, man! Roberto, he's down on the main floor. Out this door, hang a right."

"Good man, now piss off."

The kid released him, and stepped past him. The bomber and the creepy girl made no motion to stop him, and the guard didn't waste the opportunity to go running out the door.

Without a word, Tsuna went to the right, Gokudera and Chrome went to the left. One minute in, Ryohei said over the radio _"All clear."_

Tsuna pushed through into the main warehouse floor, and was met by three ragged-looking twenty-somethings with guns. Fortunately, they were slow, and Tsuna was very fast. He moved past each of them before they could think to fire, disarmed two and knocked each to the ground. With an easy movement he released the magazine from each pistol, dropped the guns, and went for the last. A shaky hand fired once, but even if Tsuna couldn't dodge bullets, he could follow the man's line of sight and move away just before he fired. Tsuna went low and drove his elbow into the man's stomach so hard the man fell over and vomited.

Tsuna nearly winced, took a deep breath, and said "Lascia, e non sarà male." _Leave, and you will not be hurt._ His accent was probably painful—he still had trouble with the L sound—but evidently they understood him pretty well. The first two skedaddled, and the third just managed to push himself up and hobble away, glancing over his shoulder to make sure he wasn't about to be shot in the back. Tsuna didn't take offense to it—if he were anybody else, that would be a well-founded fear.

"Che cazzo é questo?" _What the fuck is this?_ Is what was said by the newcomer, from the far end of the warehouse floor.

Tsuna walked, only walked, and called out "Signore Roberto?"

"Eh? Giappone…" the man said, as Tsuna approached. "Sei…Trad Seis?"

Two and a half minutes in, Rico said " _Got some buzz about a disturbance out at the docks._ " Tsuna and Gokudera both confirmed that they heard him.

"Hai fatto," Tsuna said. _You're done._ "Lascia, e trovare un lavoro migliore." _Leave, and find a better job._

Roberto ground his teeth together. "Sì? Andare a morire, bastardo!" He charged at Tsuna, pulled a knife from his sleeve, and nearly screamed when Tsuna caught him with a flaming glove and pushed him off. Roberto flailed, caught himself, and drove forward again. Tsuna moved slightly to avoid his knife, but not far enough; the blade dragged across his temple and made a shallow cut that started bleeding heavily. Tsuna's arm snapped out, and he grabbed Roberto's wrist, holding it so tightly that Roberto yelled out. When Tsuna released him, he dropped, whimpering.

"Lasciare. O finirò il lavoro." _Leave, or I'll finish the job._ When the drug dealer hesitated, Tsuna shouted out "Ora!"

"Si, si!"

Tsuna watched him for a moment as he crawled away, wiped off his face, and headed for the back room Roberto had come out of.

* * *

Only one person was on guard to the left side, but he was waiting and ready for them with a large handgun. He was, however, not too bright, and emptied half of his clip into a flat image of a hulking brute Chrome had pulled out of her imagination, while Gokudera and Chrome hid on either side of the entryway.

"Huh? Some kinda magic trick?" the guard said, shaking his head.

The brute charged him, but the guard stood his ground now that he knew it wasn't real—and got blown across the room by a half-dozen sticks of dynamite hidden within the illusion.

Gokudera charged into the room, made sure there were no other guards, and went to the only other door—locked tight. He rapped his hand on the door. "Oi, Koenig? If you're alive, moan!"

"Depends on who's knocking!" said a slightly muffled voice from behind the door.

"Vongola the Tenth's Storm Guardian. Stand back, I'm gonna destroy the lock." He pulled out his igniter and set the end against the lock. The degenerating Storm Flames quickly ate through the mechanism and left a gaping hole in the metal. Gokudera pulled the door open, revealing a small lightless closet, and the short-haired scientist cowering in the back corner with his hands over his head. Gokudera raised an eyebrow. "You're Koenig?"

He looked up and blinked at the sudden light. "Aye, I am," he said irritably. "God, took long enough."

"But you're a fucking teenager," Gokudera said skeptically, and indeed, Koenig could not have been any older than Gokudera was.

"So? _Dottore_ Verde is an infant. I assume you've met him, Vongola?"

"Unfortunately. And you and I both know that's bullshit."

"Hayato," Chrome said gently.

"Right, let's get going." Gokudera spoke into his radio. "Tenth, we have Koenig."

" _Great, the ringleader ran off, and I just destroyed their stockpile. Let's get out of here."_

"Let's go, Koenig—what are you doing?"

Koenig was digging through his jailer's pockets. "C'mon, it's somewhere…aha!" he shouted out, and retrieved a small, violet box weapon bearing the emblem of the Shimon Family.

The big guard seemed to be rousing from being knocked out. "Eugh…what hit me?"

"Ha! Time for some payback, lowlife!" Koenig's ring ignited with Cloud Flames, and with an easy motion he opened the box. A streak of Cloud Flames erupted from the box and covered his arms up to the shoulder, and solidified into armor with vicious blades along the forearms.

With a look of glee on his face, Koenig lunged for his jailor. Gokudera only just got to him quickly enough to grab Koenig under the arms and pin his arms back. Chrome stepped in front of the guard.

"We're not here to kill them," Chrome said.

"The hell? Why wouldn't you, they're just lowlife scum!"

"It doesn't matter, they don't deserve to die. Now let's go, before something goes wrong."

"I'd heard some things about the Tenth Gen, but I'm amazed at your naivety," Koenig said, shaking his head. He snapped his wrists back, and the blades returned to his box. He picked the box up, gave his jailer a kick in the stomach, and followed Gokudera out the door.

* * *

About ten minutes past dawn on October 13th, Yamamoto woke with a start, just in time to see a silhouetted figure in black standing on the windowsill.

In her hands, she had the Shigure Kintoki and the Vongola Gear of the Rain dangling from the handle.

The thief glanced back, then leaped from the windowsill with an easy grace into the empty road below.

"Get back here!" If Yamamoto had been in his right mind, he would have grabbed his shoes on the way out. But then, if he were in his right mind, he might have thought twice about jumping out a window to chase down a thief.

He landed hard on the cobblestone road in a ratty t-shirt and shorts, stood back up, and chased the thief down the road. Yamamoto was faster, but the thief knew the city better. She turned a corner into a side street, and when Yamamoto followed she was partway down, watching for him. She started running again, Yamamoto close on her heels, came out into the thoroughfare, vaulted over a car's hood that he had to go around, dove through a tent newspaper stand that he nearly crashed through, and by the time he had followed the thief down the next side street and around the corner into an alley, she had vanished into a dead end.

"Ciao-ciao, _Giappone!_ "

He whirled around, and she was standing on the roof over the dead end, waving the shinai at him and saluting mockingly before walking away.

"You—get back here, or I'll cut you in half!"

There was a rusty old fire escape up one of the buildings. Yamamoto pulled down the ladder and clambered upward. At the top, he was just fast enough to see the thief duck into a roof hatch at the end of the block. He ran across the rooftops, regardless of the pain in his feet and his ire blinding him. He threw open the hatch, dropped into the dark building, and shouted out "I know you're in here! Show yourself and return my things, and I'll let you live!"

He couldn't see a thing in the room. "I'll give you to the count of three! _Uno_!" His father would disown him if he lost the old sword to carelessness. " _Due_!" He had been trusted to care for the Vongola Gear, Ugetsu had trusted him with that inheritance. " _Tré!_ "

" _Voi!_ Looks like time's up!"

The hatch slammed shut, and the room became so bright Yamamoto was blinded.

When the spots had cleared in his vision, he realized that the building's outside appearance had been deceptive—the room was built like a modern bunker. Across the chamber, the one and only Superbi Squalo lounged in some velvet mockery of a throne, resting his chin on his intact hand, his sword's edge glinting in the light.

The thief stood at his side, holding Yamamoto's sword almost reverently. She had removed her outer coat, and he could now see the Varia emblem worn at her breast.

"Give me back my sword," he said, ignoring Squalo completely. He hated himself for it, but said "I'm the Tenth Rain Guardian, now hand it over!"

" _Voi!_ What kind of Guardian isn't Guarding anything!" Squalo took the sword and Vongola Gear, then said " _Bene_ , Mako. Now piss off."

" _Sì, Capitano_ ," she said, and was gone.

"What do you want?"

"For you to get a fucking grip."

"I'm not in the mood, Squalo."

"Not in the—" Squalo's face twisted into a scowl. A rain flame ignited on the surface of his ring, and with an easy swipe he opened the box at his hip. The box animal grew, and grew, and the shark Alo charged Yamamoto. He threw his hands up just as Alo ran into him, and was knocked across the room from the impact. He slid to the ground in a daze, and the tip of Squalo's sword was at his throat. "I should kill you right now, Yamamoto Takeshi. I'll kill you, and send your mangled body back to your father along with whatever's left of your sword after I snap it over my knee!" He pulled his sword back and turned away. "Wouldn't even be worth the energy. What a worthless brat."

"Shut up." Yamamoto pulled himself to his feet. He was shaking. "Just…what do you know? You're…you said it yourself, you've been obsessed with your boss since day 1, never doubted a word of it. Is that…is that a Rain Guardian? Like a dog?" Squalo had stopped. "Kill me, fine, cause it'd be less of a shame than telling my dad I'd forgotten my way and turned myself into a machine with a blade!"

"Never doubted a word of it?" Squalo spat. "I haven't done anything but doubt that shitty-ass boss." He grabbed Yamamoto's sword, and with a flick of his wrist it turned into a katana. The Rain Necklace sparked with Rain flames. "A dog? Don't give yourself so much credit, you're like a lost puppy how you chase after Sawada. What's so special about him?"

"He saved my life."

"Course he did." Squalo turned over the blade, glanced at the swallow emblem inscribed in the blade, and threw the sword and necklace at Yamamoto end-over-end. Yamamoto snapped it out of the air by the handle without barely thinking about it. "Who the fuck called you a dog? Sawada isn't exactly the egomaniacal type."

Yamamoto hesitated. "Thanks for the warning—about Schnitten Brabanters. He tried to attack me."

"Oh? That old man's head is so far up his own ass, he's like the fucking Ouroboros." Squalo spat again. "Stand up and fight, Tenth Rain Guardian, so I can beat a lesson into you."

Yamamoto had no chance to prepare himself, Squalo charged him instantly. Yamamoto just brought his blade up to fend off the attack. "What's the lesson?"

"The duty of the Guardian of Rain." Squalo rocked back on his heels and moved forward to put his momentum into his forward thrusts.

"Requiem rain, clearing the battlefield," Yamamoto muttered.

" _Voi_! Get that outta your head, century-and-a-half old proverbs have no place here!" Squalo's attacks came relentlessly even as he spoke. "You know why you won in the Ring Conflict? You had no right to it, and still have no right to be able to stand against me. You didn't win because of some fucking invincible sword style—you won because you're too stupid to realize it should have been impossible! And that's the one thing you got going for you!" He struck, putting force behind his attack such that Yamamoto was temporarily stunned. "You don't fucking think! You start thinking about stupid shit like the Ninth Rain Guardian, and you can't think about anything else! You think yourself to death!"

Yamamoto spun the cord of the rain necklace around his hand, and held the charm tightly. Kojirou burst from the surface and led his charge at Squalo in a wave of Rain Flames. Squalo stepped away as he approached and smacked Yamamoto's side with the flat of his blade. Yamamoto's charge broke and he went stumbling, but managed to stay standing.

"What a fucking joke of a technique, leaves you wide fucking open. Has that 'Scontro di Rondine' worked even once?"

Yamamoto bit back a curse, and shuddered involuntarily at the member of going face-first into a wall hidden in an illusion. "Kojirou, Jirou, Cambio Forma version X."

"Don't even bother!" Squalo moved again, drove the point of his blade into the base of Yamamoto's sword, and twisted his wrist so that it was forced out of his hand. "I've heard of what you do with those 'Brazen Blades'. You're so terrified of illusionists that you've overspecialized to take them on."

Jirou came up beside him, and Yamamoto grabbed two of the empty hilts out of his harness and ignited them with rain flames. He stood, took a deep breath, and held his blades at the ready.

"Hmph. Better." Squalo flourished his sword through empty air. "You know what the duty of the Guardian of Rain is? Well here's the fucking secret—all bosses are idiots. Doesn't matter which one it is, they're all fucking morons. I know it enough that every time Xanxus is about to do something stupid, my stump aches." He flourished his sword again to make his point. "And Sawada Tsunayoshi is no exception to that. Your job is to make up for his stupidity by being the only person to not overthink it. You're the one who points out the problems to start with, who comes out on top when the chips are down, who comes flying in to save the day."

His tone was sarcastic, but Yamamoto caught his allusions to the Rain Battle when the Varia was up 3 to 1, and when Daemon Spade was about to kill Kaoru.

"Doesn't sound like much of a dog to me. Sounds like you decided to follow Sawada just like I decided to follow Xanxus all those years ago."

Yamamoto was breathing heavily. He looked from Squalo, to his sword, to the charm on the Rain Necklace. _I…just wanted to see where that Dying Will would take him. I don't know if I follow him, but I trust him like nobody else._ "I…I screwed up, I think."

"Tch. Took long enough to figure it out. Now get out, not worth trying to test you like this, brat."

Yamamoto smiled in spite of himself. "Thanks, Squalo." Squalo looked like he was going to gag. Yamamoto used his sword to push the hatch open again, leaped up to it to grab the edge, and pulled himself up. When he shut the hatch, it locked from the inside with a _click._

 _Man, I hope they're okay. Ugh, I left my phone back at the hotel. Along with…everything else._ He suddenly became very aware that he was wearing pajamas in public. "Ha, this must be what Tsuna feels like. Alright, step one, figure out where I am, step two, find a phone."

* * *

Officer Petrelli cursed the early morning shift, took a sip of his coffee, and stepped out of his cruiser a few hundred feet down from the supposed source of the disturbance. He noted a couple delinquents sitting in the shade of an old shipping container, but he was downwind of them, and it was only tobacco they were smoking. It was just barely past dawn when he stepped in front of the warehouse that once belonged to Carcassa Freight.

 _God, what a fiasco. Months of legwork and paperwork. And it's not like anything's changed; there was maybe a week between when Legiérre got busted, and when the supply picked right back up again. One enemy for another. What a fucking mess._ It was enough to make him pick up smoking again. _Huh, I woulda thought the door would have been chained shut._

From his position, he couldn't _see_ the door, and subsequently could not see the scorch marks that had been left on it by the explosion. When he approached the open doorway, something shifted in his gut, and he put a hand on his holstered gun.

A shadow moved inside the room, and Officer Petrelli leaped back and fell on his ass just as a yellow-haired cat shot out of the building and down the docks. He put a hand to his chest. "Holy fuck, note to self, don't let the guys know you nearly shot a damn cat." He laughed at himself even as he was trying to get his racing heart to calm down.

The yellow cat disappeared around a building down a ways, looped back around, and his mane reignited with sky flames as he returned to his master on the second floor of the building all the way back at the front end of the dock.

Tsuna was headed up the stairs inside the building belonging to a freight company under the influence of the Vongola as Nuts barreled into his arms. "Nice work, Nuts." He scratched the Sky Lion on the back of his head.

He spoke into his earpiece. "Status on the Disciplinary Committee?"

" _We're clear and away, Sawada."_

"Perfect. Storm, Mist, are you guys okay?" Gokudera had insisted on using something resembling codenames over the radios—though he had made a face when Tsuna had called them that in particular.

" _Yes, Tenth._ " Because there were that many Tenths he could be confused with. " _A couple of suits showed up, exchanged a passcode with the scientist, and he confirmed they were Trad 6 before going off with them._ "

Tsuna hadn't even considered that. "Uh…right, thanks. You two get back—same goes for Sun. I'll see you in a bit."

When he reached the upper landing where Reborn had set up his observation post, he wasn't even surprised to find his tutor had made a miniature sniper post, complete with tripwires—probably electrified. He had really gotten a lot of mileage out of the tripwires lately.

Tsuna stepped over the tripwires, stole the military helmet Reborn had on to set on his own head, sat down beside Reborn and said "Well, I think that went pretty well."

"C minus, at best."

"What? We succeeded, didn't we? Chased off the gang, rescued Koenig, and I destroyed their stockpile—although to be fair it might have been a bad idea to set it on fire, I thought it was cocaine and it was some kind of hallucinogen, and long story short is your costume hot pink or am I hallucinating that?"

Reborn cracked his knuckles, pulled his arm back, and punched Tsuna so hard in the chin that his student went spinning out of his seat, fell right on the electrified tripwire, and nearly crushed Nuts beneath him. Nuts was yowling like a housecat trying to get out from beneath Tsuna. Nuts turned into sparks of flame and vanished back into the Sky Ring.

Tsuna shook his head to snap out of his daze, pushed his hair out of his face, and glared at Reborn

"Better?"

"Yeah, yeah."

"Alright, then let's start with your composure and lack thereof."

Tsuna sat down and listened without complaint. "What do you mean?"

"Just as the sky derives its strength from its subordinates, so too are the subordinates influenced by their Sky. You were visibly nervous and manic, which influenced the mood of your allies even if you did not intend it. In a simple job like this, the influence is minimal, but when everything is on the line projecting confidence to your subordinates can mean the difference between victory and defeat."

Tsuna didn't bother saying anything about Reborn calling his friends 'subordinates'. "Alright, fair enough."

Reborn was almost surprised that Tsuna was so readily listening to what he had to say. "Next, your plan was dependent on everything going perfectly according to plan, when that almost never happens. How would you have reacted if you had entered the building and their ringleader had a box weapon?"

"Well that's pretty unlikely for a petty drug dealer."

"That's not the question. What if he did have a box weapon?"

"Well…I guess I would have had Nuts use the Rugito di Cieli to destroy the box weapon. Or frozen it with the Zero Point Breakthrough."

"While under gunfire? And while fighting other enemies at the same time?"

Tsuna scratched the back of his head. "Alright, I see the point. Account for different scenarios. Have a plan B."

"Exactly. And then number three, your plans ended with leaving the building successfully, and meeting your Guardians later. So, were you just planning on having to babysit Koenig until you could get in contact with the Trad 6?"

"I…okay, I guess I didn't think that far ahead. Luckily, I have you to clean up after my mistakes." There weren't many other people who could have gotten in contact with the contracting family, after all.

"At least you appreciate that." Reborn turned and retrieved a first aid kit from his bag. He tossed it to Tsuna. "Clean yourself up, you're still meeting the Ninth to report—or did you forget?"

"No, I didn't forget." Tsuna used the mirror set into the lid of the first aid kit to check the cut on his forehead. It was still tender to the touch, but it had only bled so severely because it was a head wound; it was shallow, and probably wouldn't scar. "Lucky me that guy kept his knife so sharp." He started cleaning off the dried blood with an alcohol wipe.

Reborn raised an eyebrow. "One of them actually managed to strike you?"

"Yeah, yeah, I know, useless me. And it was a lazy feint, too. Guess I'm a little rusty, it's been so long since I was in a fight." Tsuna stuck a couple thin pieces of sticky gauze over the cut. _Not since...I guess there was that Carcassa mole, but that hardly counts, I pulled a gun out of his hand and he kicked me in the face. So not since…April, then, that last night Xanxus was in Japan. Heck, that was more than six months ago._ He shook his head and changed the subject. "Have you heard anything about Yamamoto?"

"Not yet. I—" It was at that moment that Reborn's cell phone started ringing with some odd jazzy tune. He smiled when he checked the caller ID. "Speak of the devil," he said, and flipped it open. " _Pronto._ "

Tsuna shut the first aid kit and shifted back and forth uncomfortably in his seat.

"Yes," Reborn said, after a pause. Then "Yeah." He held up the phone to Tsuna. "For you."

Tsuna took the phone, breathed deeply, and said "Hello?"

" _Hey, Tsuna! It's Yamamoto."_

"Hey! Uh…how are you feeling?" Tsuna already felt his nerves settling; there was an energy in Yamamoto's voice that had been missing.

 _"A lot better, but that's not important. How'd the job go?"_

"Pretty well, I think. We did what we were supposed to, and the only injury is a little scratch I got."

 _"Oh, thank god. I…man, I should just come out and say it. Sorry for how I've been acting the last couple days. It's been dumb, and selfish, and I let that old man get in my head."_

Tsuna sighed in relief. "Hey, I'm just glad to know you're feeling better. I, uh…hope the long-hair didn't abuse you too badly."

Yamamoto laughed. " _He had one of his subordinates steal my sword while I was sleeping and lead me on a chase through the city, then he threatened to break my sword in half. Wait…it wasn't you who called him? Kidding, kidding, I figured as much._ "

Tsuna was suddenly very pale. "Ha, ha-ha, funny joke. Like, are you really okay?"

 _"Nah, I'm fine. I just had my head screwed on wrong, y'know? And if there's anyone who knows how to knock me back into place, it's Squalo. He told me a lot interesting things…and the point is, I guess, from here on out, my sword is yours."_

Tsuna blinked, and felt like he had been hit in the head with a brick. "Wait, no, that's not what I meant—I just wanted you to be happy again and not all…uh, like, kuyo-kuyo brood-brood, to borrow a phrase."

" _Well lucky for both of us, I'm most happy being around everyone._ "

Tsuna could almost hear his smile in his voice. "I…alright. Like I said, I'm glad you're feeling better. Ah, I gotta go, but I'll see you when I get back later, or whenever."

" _Ha-ha, you're still the same old Tsuna. Later!_ "

The call ended, and Tsuna passed Leon back over. _The same old Tsuna? I mean I like to think I haven't changed much, at least fundamentally._ He shook his head. _Stupid brain, however he meant it, it wouldn't have been to make fun of me. Stop overthinking things._

The day had started fairly well, now to see how it would go downhill from there.

* * *

The next thing Tsuna learned that day was that the Ninth Cloud Guardian was far less terrifying than Hibari, but that might have been because he was also far less of a bloodthirsty individual. So when Visconti met him at the entrance to the intimidatingly-large Vongola headquarters called "The Iron Fortress" just outside Palermo, and led him to the conference room where the Ninth was holding a meeting and had agreed to take Tsuna from, Tsuna felt fairly comfortable with bringing up a question that had been bugging him for a long while.

"Can I ask you a question, sir?" he said, even as a secretary pushed past him. Well, Tsuna couldn't exactly blame her, it was busy in the hall, and Tsuna just looked like another kid, and not anything special, either. He had come straight here without changing despite having a set of nicer clothes in his bag, and he had worn his third set of flame-proof clothes, a black button-up and cargo pants, which were comfortable and suited him, but didn't exactly give off an air of authority.

"Of course, Tenth."

"So, um. Your name…well, you, and the other Ninth Guardians, I'm assuming your names are actually codenames?"

Visconti seemed to smile. "Indeed, they are. My real name is Victor, but it becomes habit to be referred to by your codename."

"Alright. I figured, since, well, all of the Ninth Generation Guardians are named after sweets," Tsuna said quickly.

"Yes, you would be correct on that."

"Right, but, the thing is, most of them are fairly easy to figure out the influence. Like the Ninth Sun Guardian is Brow Nie Jr., and Coyote Nougat is named for nougat, and apparently Ganache is a type of sugary filling. According to my friend Haru, Bouche Croquant is probably a pun off of Croquembouche. Schnitten Brabanters…" Tsuna unconsciously tensed at the name of the Ninth Rain Guardian. "Schnitten is a type of German dessert, and Brabanter is probably a reference to a place in Belgium, where a lot of chocolate is made?"

"Sounds accurate thus far," Visconti said, a little amused at Tsuna's rambling.

"Alright, so, then, what I can't figure out, is what your code name is supposed to be a reference to? I thought it might be a pun off of Biscotti, since they're pronounced similarly if you write them in katakana, but I didn't think that really worked since you're, um, Italian." Tsuna rubbed the back of his neck awkwardly.

"Certainly, that could be one interpretation," he said. "However, I believe that when the Ninth was creating my codename, he was thinking of the Italian word, Visconti, which means 'viscount', and how for much of history, only nobility could have desserts and other sweet things."

"I see! Thanks for explaining, it's been bugging me for a while now, but I was afraid Reborn would call me an idiot if I asked."

Visconti laughed aloud. "Want to know something about your tutor, Tenth?"

"I…that depends, does it involve murder?"

"Not this one. About five years ago, the young Bronco was visiting here in order to renew his family's alliance. I was speaking with Reborn, when suddenly he froze, looked at me, and said 'They're all stupid puns based off of desserts!' Keeping in mind, he had been working for the Ninth for fifteen years previous to this, and he had thought for that entire time that Coyote's surname was actually 'Nougat'."

Tsuna's eyes widened. _This is the best day of my life._ "Thanks. I'll keep that in mind," he said, deceptively calmly. _Oh he might kick my ass but it'll be sooo worth it._

"Think nothing of it. Now, then, may I ask you a question in kind?"

Tsuna pinched himself back to reality, then said "Yeah, go for it."

"If I pry too much, tell me so, and I will give you my greatest apologies. But, when you mentioned Bruno—that is, Brabanters—you seemed…irritated. Is there something the matter?"

If the pinch wasn't enough, that was a sobering question to be sure. "Oh, that is, I don't mean to start anything, and I haven't even spoken to him personally. But…apparently, the other day, he said some things to…to my Rain Guardian, Yamamoto, about like loyalty and not like normal loyalty but like a samurai to their daimyo, or really explicitly like a dog to its owner, and it really set him off-balance. Yamamoto, I mean. But, it's alright now, the Varia Captain Squalo helped him figure things out apparently, and it's all good."

"Oh? Bruno has always been a…interesting case."

 _I'm pretty sure that describes most of the mafia. And I doubt you're entirely innocent of thinking about the world in some pretty screwed-up terms, most of the people I've met from this world are like that. From Gokudera dedicating himself to me for life, to Lambo being told he would be the next boss of the Bovino if he could kill Reborn. The Ninth casually manipulating people without a second thought._ His eyes went over the people in the headquarters, from secretaries to assassins to medics, and nearly laughed so he wouldn't cry.

 _The Ninth said he wanted me to turn the family back to its roots, but how many people in this building have a moral compass solid enough to want to do such a thing? One in ten? In a hundred? And how many of the others would resist such a change, and violently. I couldn't protect my friends from that many threats all at once. I wouldn't be able to actually help anybody, I'd be so busy protecting myself from internal threats. I'd have to…to…it just doesn't seem possible! I'd need to already be surrounded by allies, and unfortunately more than just Gokudera-kun, Yamamoto, Lambo, Chrome-san, Hibari-san, and Ryohei-niisan. And don't forget the Foundation! Barely more than a street gang…be surrounded by allies I can trust, and then essentially dismantle the Vongola as it currently exists, pick it apart, take those who are not only willing, but want to do good for others. I'd…I'd have to destroy it all, and build something out of the pieces._

"Here we are, Tenth," Visconti said, breaking him out of his thoughts in front of a room with a grand entryway. "You may take a moment to prepare yourself, if you need, and enter when you please."

"I'd just as well go without waiting, or I'll chicken out," Tsuna said. Visconti chuckled, and opened the door for Tsuna.

Tsuna walked in the room, and nearly passed out from the aura of its inhabitants.

At the war table—it was the only way it could be described, the stone slab set into the wood carved with a detailed map of the earth and covered with a thick sheet of glass—was several people, half of whom Tsuna did not know. At the head of the table, the Ninth stood with an authoritative air, his gaze dark. On his right sat a man who had turned to look at Tsuna the moment he entered the room, sneered, and made a comment in Italian. His teeth were uncomfortably white, and his eyes were pale blue. Behind the Ninth, Ganache the Third stood silently on guard, comfortable but no less intimidating. A black woman with stern eyes and short curly hair was to the Ninth's left after an empty seat; across from her was a man in a white pin-striped suit, his hands decorated with rings.

The last had his back to Tsuna, but the ire he raised at Tsuna's entrance made him unmistakable. Xanxus didn't even bother to look before making a noise of disgust deep in his throat.

"Tsunayoshi," the Ninth said, nodding and gesturing for Tsuna to come stand beside him. Tsuna tried not to show his apprehension as he crossed the room and stood before the Ninth.

The old man put a hand on his shoulder, and the man with pale eyes tutted loudly, and said something in Italian along the lines of "The kid's got no sense of decorum, does he?" Except, he didn't say 'kid', but an ethnic slur that Gokudera, while teaching Tsuna how to recognize if somebody was insulting him in Italian, had refused to say aloud.

The Ninth quickly spoke up with "I ask if you might please speak in Japanese, for the sake of my guest, my successor."

Xanxus laughed. "Didja forget the fucker over there is too high and mighty to learn anything besides Italian?" he said, specifically in Japanese. He then added a few choice insults in Hindi. The Ninth ignored him.

"It's alright, I know a little Italian, and I wouldn't want to make it difficult for anyone," Tsuna said, speaking slowly. He looked directly at the pale-eyed man as he said "I'm sorry, I didn't catch your name, mister…"

"Humph. Grimaldi, if you please," he said, irritated.

"Forgive me, Tsunayoshi, we were in the middle of some negotiations," the Ninth said. "However, it is a good opportunity for you to meet one of our closest allies. And of course, there is my chief advisor, Roccio Grimaldi." He gestured to the self-proclaimed Mr. Grimaldi.

The man in the pin-striped suit spoke up. "Bernardo Russet. A pleasure to meet at last, Decimo. I am an executive for the Vertolli Trade Group."

"Fucking pompous Trad 6 asshole," Xanxus muttered, also in Japanese. It was crude, and Xanxus still scared the hell out of Tsuna, but it was also a much-needed clarification.

The curly-haired black woman spoke last. "I am Giralia, chief executive for Bertolli."

"I'm Tsunayoshi Sawada," he said. Bernardo stood in order to shake his hand from across the table.

"We never had a chance to meet, but I was at the Inheritance Ceremony," Bernardo said, and winked. For being an executive for a rising family, he was young, no older than Dino was, although he wore a goatee to disguise his youth.

"Shush, B," Giralia said. She rose from her seat and shook Tsuna's hand. Tsuna caught her eyes going over the Sky Ring, but he said nothing of it—though he did take notice of a ring she wore, holding a high-quality green stone.

"I've heard about the Trad 6 a little," Tsuna said. "Uh, sorry, I don't mean to say that as an insult, I'm a little ignorant about some of the Vongola's allies."

"Understandable," Giralia said, waving it off. "Besides, from what I hear, you did us no small favor today, Decimo. That gang has been a thorn in my side for a few weeks now. And it would have been a major setback to lose Koenig's brilliant mind. I look forward to working together in the future." She looked at the Ninth, and said "I wonder if we might take a break? My associate needs another cup of coffee, and I'd like to check on the cleanup."

"Of course," the Ninth said, inclining his head.

"Thank you, Vongola. Come, Bernardo."

"Oi, I'm not a servant to be ordered around," he said, even as he stepped in line behind her.

Even before the door shut, Grimaldi was spitting insults that Tsuna didn't catch. He turned his eyes on Tsuna, and suddenly the large room felt a lot smaller when he realized that he, the Ninth, and Xanxus were looking at him.

"Uh…oh, this is the part where I'm supposed to make a report." He cleared his throat and started through in stumbling Italian, often adding a clarification in Japanese that the Ninth translated for Grimaldi. He began with the plan, and ended with Reborn picking up the slack where Tsuna had forgotten loose ends.

"Speaking of the infant," Grimaldi said with a sneer, "it seems _la piccola merda_ has lost some backbone. Not that he had much to start with."

Tsuna gaped at him, and must have looked weird enough doing it that Xanxus snorted. Tsuna couldn't hide his surprise at the sheer gall of the comment. That, and most people like the Ninth, serious and older, seemed to have a lot of respect for the former Arcobaleno. "What the hell are you talking about?" he said, speaking in Japanese without thinking.

Grimaldi snapped his fingers at him. Tsuna was suddenly really tempted to break his fingers, and found himself wishing that he could do one of those arm-twisting joint locks like he was so often subjected to. Grimaldi snapped his fingers again. "Speak Italian, kid."

Once again, it was not 'kid', but an ethnic slur.

It was Xanxus who spoke up first. "You're one to talk, old man, half your fucking vocabulary is insults."

"Xanxus!" the Ninth said in warning.

Tsuna set a hand on the table. "What the problem with my tutor?" he said.

"Your clothes. That you were allowed to be in the presence of the Ninth wearing denim and headphones says a lot of things about your _tutor_ , none of them good."

"Or that there's more important things to be worried about than getting dressed up in a monkey suit for some—"

The Ninth put a hand on his shoulder, and Tsuna bit back the rest of his sentence.

Grimaldi took the Ninth's intervention as an invitation to continue talking. "It seems this is the last great generation of Vongola, if this is our future. A child who can barely speak properly, executives that are barely more than children." He stood, and rested his hand in his pocket. "I'll be in my office, Ninth."

"I'll send for you when the meeting resumes," the Ninth said coldly.

Tsuna pulled himself out of the Ninth's grip—the old man was stronger than he looked. Before Grimaldi had even properly left the room, Tsuna started in on "Why didn't you say anything? He insulted me and my friends and Reborn!"

"Roccio is abrasive, to be sure, but his knowledge of economic matters is unmatched."

"He's an asshole!" Tsuna said, forgetting himself for a moment. The Ninth fixed him with a glare that quickly reminded him. Tsuna still didn't apologize.

"Xanxus, you are dismissed."

A rolling wave of heat accompanied the affirmative grunt.

"Wait, Xanxus," Tsuna said suddenly—and squealed when Xanxus turned and glared at him. "I'm sorry! I just—" He nearly said that he was hoping to one into one of his subordinates, but thought better of it. Instead, Tsuna pulled his backpack off and pulled out a medium-sized bottle of alcohol labeled as 'Yobiru'. "Sorry, I know I'm a couple days late, but, happy birthday."

Xanxus looked from Tsuna to the bottle. He actually looked stunned at the pronouncement. He absently took the bottle, which had a neat orange bow tied around the neck, and said "The fuck is this?"

"It's, uh, Japanese whiskey. Um, I don't really know much about alcohol, to be honest, so I asked my mom what would be good to get, since you seem like the kind of person who likes finer things, so…" He had gotten that impression from the sheer number of times he had heard one person or another yelling about how the Varia Boss was to be undisturbed because he was either eating steak or drinking, but he didn't mention that.

Xanxus suddenly seemed to come to life again. His arm snapped out, grabbed the front of Tsuna's shirt, and dragged him along nearly choking.

The Ninth was fairly sure Xanxus wasn't going to murder Tsuna, but then that was why Visconti was somewhere around with a stun gun in hand, just in case.

It was barely ten feet before Tsuna got himself free by slipping out of his shirt, but he continued following Xanxus anyways, both to get his shirt back and out of curiosity. Although, when Nuts growled lightly, he recalled the proverb 'curiosity killed the cat' and shivered.

Through one hall and another, and Xanxus threw the shirt back at Tsuna. It was smoldering slightly from an attempt to burn it. _Good thing I_ did _wear my combat gear._ He was pulling it back on just as Xanxus was kicking open the door to a small lounge, and all the prior inhabitants—all wearing the Varia emblem—didn't need to even look up to know who was approaching.

Several Varia subordinates scattered as Xanxus approached a small table, set down the bottle, and grunted. Tsuna took it as an order to sit. One of the Varia subordinates chanced a glance at Tsuna while Xanxus' back was turned, saw the ring that Tsuna wore, and the whispers started. Tsuna could only sigh as he fiddled with the buttons of his shirt.

Xanxus returned with two small glasses. He sat, pulled out the stopper on the bottle, and poured a small amount into each glass. He pushed one over to Tsuna. "Drink."

"Uh, I don't really," he started, and then caught one of the Varia subordinates shaking his head at him over Xanxus' shoulder. "Alright…" _Probably making sure I didn't poison it._ Tsuna picked up the glass, braced himself, and took a sip. He nearly gagged on it, and it took all of his self-control to not spit it out at the taste. He just managed to swallow it—then he looked up, and nearly emptied his stomach when he saw the crooked smile of Xanxus. _Oh god did he poison my glass? Stop smiling!_

"Get a fucking grip, trash," Xanxus said, the smile quickly replaced with a scowl. He leaned back in his chair and took a drink. "Fuck it's like it's been watered down," he muttered. He took another sip anyways. "If I'm going to kill you, it'll be a bullet, or Bester's claws tearing you apart."

That did not make him feel much better. "Right. Uh…" He looked at his glass, still mostly full, and remembered the cause for celebration. He raised his glass half-heartedly. "To another year survived, then."

There was that crooked smile again. "Ha! I'll drink to that!" Xanxus shouted, and drained his glass. Tsuna followed his lead, even if he knew it would make him feel sick.

Xanxus poured another glass, but didn't make like he was going to force Tsuna to have another. "You've got reason to hate the old fuck."

Before Tsuna could think better of it, he said "Which one?"

"The asshole." He tilted his head back, and barely muttered "If he hadn't argued my case—ha! Me and the shitty shark would be spending the rest of our lives locked up in the deepest part of the Vindice prison. Told the Ninth he'd be losing a 'major asset'."

Tsuna didn't relax, despite how Xanxus seemed to be rambling.

"But don't forget, shit-boss," Xanxus said, sitting back up. "If I weren't around, the midgets would probably be dead. So be grateful."

Tsuna hesitated for a long while. "I…there's no way I can ever describe the extent of my gratitude, Xanxus. But…even putting that aside, not even you deserve to be forgotten in the deepest part of Vendicare. The sensory deprivation tanks are apparently horrific."

Xanxus clicked his teeth. "I'll take that as a compliment."

As Xanxus took another drink, Tsuna's brain was in overdrive. _So the Ninth did want to punish Xanxus—and Squalo as his right hand—more severely? I was a little surprised that Xanxus wasn't only still working for the Vongola, but is apparently allowed within a hundred feet of the Ninth. But apparently Grimaldi has some sway. Who is he, then?_ "What's so special about Grimaldi, then?" he thought aloud, without really thinking about it.

"Not a damn thing. But he's got an ego the size of Europe, old ties to the family, and the balls of half the corrupt cops in Italy. You know how many corrupt cops there are in Italy?"

"I'm guessing a lot."

"A-fucking-lot."

"You don't seem to like him very much, for 'pleading your case' as you put it."

"He's a jackass. I don't owe him shit."

Tsuna nodded, and set his glass down. _I think I'm right on the verge of overstaying my welcome._ He stood and said "Well, uh, until next time, then." Because he had no doubt he would have the _pleasure_ of seeing Xanxus again.

"Hmph."

Tsuna very slowly backed out of the lounge, and only once he was past the threshold that he dared to turn around, and immediately took off running before Xanxus could change his mind about letting him go without a major injury.

* * *

 _A/N: Cultural notes. 'Yobiru' is a jisho-powered translation of literally just 'Good Beer' in Japanese. This year Xanxus gets 'Yo-' which is good, next year is 'Oo-' which is grand, and the year after he gets 'Ten-' which is heavenly. Sort of. Don't quote me on that._

 _Speaking of language-all of the Italian is powered by Google Translate. However, this is probably going to be one of the last times that is an issue, once Tsuna is halfway fluent in Italian it'll just all be rendered in English. Until then, it bothers me too much to have everyone speaking Japanese/English._

 _That Reborn didn't catch on to the sweets theme in all that time is even worse than Visconti knows-Reborn has worked for the Vongola starting from about 1962, when it is 2008 in story, with about a ten year gap from 76 to 86 after he was cursed. He just has no idea, because in my own little universe, Checkerface did some memory screwery after cursing the Arcobaleno such that outside of Luce, while their loved ones didn't forget them, they could not make the mental leap between the person they had been and the person they are now. For example, Fon has a sister, who is Hibari's mother. After Fon was cursed, as far as she knew her brother had simply vanished off the face of the Earth without a trace, and could not connect Fon to her brother, even when he grabbed her and told her as much, she was psychologically disturbed but quickly forgot. The only person to ever really break the programming so to speak was the Ninth, and it took him five years past when Reborn had returned to working for the Vongola, and he has Hyper Intuition pushing him along._

 _This is a humor story I swear to god. (Phoenix says, as she plots out disturbing sequences ten to fifteen chapters from now)_

 _Also, I'm pretty sure that "His head is so far up his own ass he's like the fucking Ouroboros" is my favorite line I've ever written._

 _And, significantly, this chapter marks the last that is pre-written. We'll see how the update schedule goes from here, but I promise, I have too many ideas to leave this unfinished._


	15. Birthdays and Other Depressing Things

_A/N: Writer's block my old nemesis, we meet again._

 _EDIT 12/9/15: Minor change in description of Reborn's age, cleanup_

 **Target 15: Birthdays and Other Depressing Things**

Tsuna touched the side of his face gently. "Not even a hint of a scar, and it wasn't a clean cut either. Kyoko said he'd been looking at human biology, but I didn't think oniisan was really the studying type."

"He isn't, but he's a good auditory learner," Reborn said, as he reassembled one of his guns after stripping and cleaning every part. "He asked how to be a better field medic; I gave him some audio files on the subject to listen to while he trains. Colonnello apparently did the same thing when he was learning military history."

"So he's improving his abilities as a medic, and Chrome is increasing her own direct combat abilities and is nearly fluent in Italian, Lambo is focusing his resolve better..."

"And you've hardly done a thing to improve yourself as of late. No, you've not just stagnated, you've gotten worse. We'll need to remedy that."

"Hey, that's not true, I've gotten better in my classes, haven't I?" And he had, he was averaging 60s in most classes and if he kept up the momentum he could have solid B averages by winter break. He could get into Nami High yet. "I know, I know, that guy shouldn't have gotten anywhere near me. I even saw it coming, but I couldn't react fast enough to get out of the way when that's never been a problem."

"Stop that, at this rate I'll be out of a job."

"I doubt it. Not as long as the Ninth keeps trying to convince me to change my mind and succeed him. And the fact that today would have gone a lot less smoothly if you hadn't picked up the slack for me." He pulled on a clean hoodie, grabbed a box he had hidden beneath his bed, and said "Now, keep on lecturing if you have to, but do you want your Birthday present or not?"

"You aren't going to get out of-" Reborn stopped, frowned, thought about it for a second, counted it out on his fingers, then said "Yesterday was the thirteenth."

A smile tugged at Tsuna's lips. "Yeah."

"...Happy Birthday, then."

"And a belated one to you." When Reborn made no motion to move, still pondering how he'd lost track of the date, Tsuna pulled off the lid of the box. "And I thought you weren't making a big deal out of it since it's an even-year birthday." Which was true either way you looked at it; he had always called himself one year old even if his cursed body was more like a newborn's, so he was two years old; and though Tsuna didn't know it, chronologically Reborn was 58 years old.

He was snapped out of his thoughts by Tsuna tossing a present badly wrapped in tissue paper at him. Reborn eyed him, and pulled away the tissue paper to reveal a prim black fedora with a short brim, identical to his old one with the exception of a bright yellow band in place of the old orange one, and a tiny silver pin shaped like a chameleon curled in on itself set on the right side.

Tsuna started rambling while Reborn ran his hand along the brim. "I noticed that your old one was getting a little beat up, when I went to get this one the image online made the band look a lot more orange but I just picked it up yesterday, from some tailor a few blocks north of here, and yours still looks fine and it's nowhere near as bad as the one Mukuro poked holes in, when you used it as a decoy?"

"You're rambling."

"Sorry."

"As for the hat that Mukuro put holes in..." Reborn removed his hat, and Leon crawled out one of three similar holes in the top. "The one I got to replace this one was incinerated."

Tsuna whistled innocently, pretending that he had not accidentally set it on fire while training with the Vongola Gear.

Leon crawled down Reborn's hand, and he set the new hat on his head. Leon took up the new perch, and Reborn smiled. "Thanks."

* * *

When Amy got stuck working an extra shift after her coworker broke her foot, she didn't complain. When Amy was told that a group consisting of five teenagers, a five year old, and a two year old was being put in her section, she didn't complain.

She did however complain quietly to her fellow servers when a middle-aged man who was definitely a gangster came into the restaurant, tried to kick one of the teenagers, apparently his son who was celebrating his fifteenth birthday with his friends, in the head, only to fail spectacularly when the two year old pushed the birthday boy to the side just enough that his father went careening past him, straight into an empty booth behind their table, which Amy had to then set right.

"Hey, that's what you get serving teenagers," Arnoldo said, shrugging.

"It's not the damn teenagers, it's that middle-aged man! Hell, it's never the teenagers, even back in the states most of the time the teenagers left big tips while the 50 year olds leave 10% if you're lucky, if you're not they leave religious literature, that looks like a $20. And the most the teenagers ever do is leave a mess or hang around a while, the middle-age men get creepy and the women get clingy." She shivered.

"Don't go expectin tips, Ams," Arnoldo said sternly. Amy was an international student, going to the school of art in Palermo, and it had been a fun time trying to calm her down when she didn't get a tip on her first customer at the tiny casual dining joint.

"Yeah, yeah, buzz off, and stop callin me Ams." She balanced the first tray on her arm and walked out to the dining room expertly.

The old man had squeezed in between the birthday boy and the silver-haired teenager, and the tension was palpable. The silver-hair was glaring at the birthday boy's father, the smiling kid was trying to cool down the silver-hair, and the scary guy who was sitting at a table on his own with his feet up was giving off a killing intent so furious it made her hair stand on end.

Amy did not speak a word of Japanese, but the irritation was evident in the birthday boy's voice when he said "Naze anata wa, mada koko ni tousan desuka?"

"Ehh? Watashi wa kare no tanjōbi ni watashi no kawaii musuko o mitainode~ Tsuuuna~ Oi oi, waitress!" He had switched easily to Italian. "Isn't there something special you guys do for birthdays? Sing happy birthday for my son!"

Amy smiled and said nothing, having already been asked by the birthday boy in stumbling Italian to not do what he called 'stupid birthday stuff', which she could well understand. She passed around dishes, and watched out of the corner of his eye as the man tried to steal from his son's plate only to get his hand smacked with the flat of a butter knife. Then he tried to steal from the infant's plate, and she nearly intervened on the part of the child no matter how eloquent of a child he was, only to do a double-take and realize that yes that infant was putting a grown man in a joint lock.

Even that however was not enough to dissuade him, as he then tried to steal from the five year old, who, as normal children are wont to do, started crying until he apologized.

And at that point, Amy grabbed her manager, got an all clear, went back out to the table and said "Sir, you are disturbing our customers, there have been some complaints. I have to ask you to please either cease your disruptive behavior, or leave the building."

He had glared at Amy, and she was then even more certain that he was a gangster, but she had been working for ten hours and the night before for another ten hours and still had to study for a test on Monday and did not have time for this. The only reason she wasn't a bit rougher was because she still really needed this job and rule one of the service industry is 'Do not hurl expletives at the customers.'

Fortunately, he left without complaint, and she got a round of "Thanks" and "Arigato gozaimasu" for it.

The rest of the main course went without complaint, and when she brought out the desserts the worst she had to deal with was the infant pushing the birthday boy's face into his bowl of Gelato, which was pretty moderate as far as she was concerned.

When the party had finished up, paid, and left the restaurant (the smiling kid and the silver-hair carrying the guest of honor out on their shoulders, predictably ending with the boy smacking his face into the top of the doorframe) she had decided that it would fall under the category of "Funny stories to tell at Christmas this year".

Then she went to clean the table.

At the spot where the birthday boy had been sitting, there was a note written in painstaking Italian on a scrap of paper. _"Thank you for the wonderful service and putting up with all the weirdness. I noticed you had an American accent, so consider this a tip as apology for the trouble."_

She moved the note and her eyes widened at the small stack of bills. She counted it quietly, came up with €250 (about $250US), saying not a word, then slipped it away in her pocket. Technically she wasn't supposed to take tips; in reality, however, every server there occasionally got American tourists who knew nothing about tipping customs overseas, and if they got tipped they usually kept quiet about it, although that much for a bill that was a fraction of the amount tipped was the stuff of legend among servers and uncommon, to say the least. _Hey, mom always said don't look a gift horse in the mouth. No instant ramen tonight!_

* * *

Fingers drummed on the surface of the desk. "Think it's too early to have a drink?"

"Well, it's five o' clock somewhere."

"Where you get that line from, your grandmother?"

"Erm, sorry."

"Pfft." Dante eyed the bottle of brandy on the tea cart, but after a long moment of struggle tore his gaze away.

"Boss, I don't meant to intrude, but is something the matter?"

"Ezekiel turned off his phone. Or more likely, he broke it again."

"As you say."

"But he was supposed to be back in Italy at 11 this morning. His flight was on time, but he wasn't on it. Bah." He shook his head.

"I'm sure he just missed his connection."

Dante glanced at his companion, a relatively normal-looking 20-something man who was in severe want of a spine. Gian Barbarossa defied his name with brown hair on his head and little on his jaw. They had been friends since university, Dante and Barbarossa, and that had continued even after Dante unwillingly succeeded his father as the head of the Adamo Family. As much as Dante enjoyed Barbarossa's company, the man was just not made for underworld.

The door opened, and Barbarossa jumped-he was easily startled, always paranoid, although that was somewhat justified; he had once been the victim of a very powerful illusionist, subjected to imagery he declined to describe, and afterwards had dedicated himself to learning how to counter illusionists and other psychics. It was useful, if a bit over-specialized. Dante still would have preferred for Barbarossa to have never gone through it-it had been one of the young Don's first tests, to rescue his friend. He still dreamed sometimes of the Not-Red-Hair shrinking away, looking for monsters that existed only in the mind.

 _And then there's this asshole,_ he thought, as the newcomer walked into the office without a care in the world and went straight for _his_ brandy without so much as a 'hello'. Dante glanced at Barbarossa first to see if he was going to say anything, then cleared his throat loudly.

"Hello, my dear nephew," said the grayhair, as he poured out a measure of alcohol at 11 in the morning. "How fares you this wonderful day?"

"What's so wonderful about it?"

"Well, you're alive, aren't you? That's something to celebrate."

Dante resisted the urge to roll his eyes. "Uncle," he said, to the man who wasn't really his uncle, more like an extended cousin slash family friend slash old guy who was a friend to his father and grandfather who has no money of his own and thus goes around stealing other people's alcohol.

"Have you put any thought into my proposal?" Giullare said. He took an easy sip.

"Uncle, it's the same as every other proposal you've given, amounting to little more than 'restore the glory of the family', hm?" Dante crossed his arms over his chest. "We've gone over this before. I'm not interested in going back to the past, I just want to provide for me and mine."

Giullare turned away from Dante, and a dark look of anger crossed his features, but when he turned it was all smiles. "Come now, Dante, it's not just the past, it's _your_ past. The Angelo Family was founded on a simple principle: ' _De virtute fit iustitia._ ' Those in power are responsible for ensuring that justice is carried out equally. And if those in power do not commit to justice, then it is only just to remove them from power. Would you claim that the Vongola and their allies are just in their rule, Dante?"

"Of course not!" he snapped. "But in case you haven't noticed, I am not at the head of the Angelo Family, I am at the head of the Adamo Family, less than half of what the Angelo ever was." He realized his mistake then, and closed his eyes and let Giullare tell the story that he never got tired of telling, while Dante had grown tired of it after the second telling.

"December 21st, 1965, the longest night of the year," Giullare said. "And certainly, for ours, it was the darkest night in our history, when some two-bit assassins with some stupid idea of grabbing power amidst chaos simultaneously attacked the Angelo and the Vongola. But where the Vongola, ever-paranoid, survived mostly intact, your great-grandfather and his son and successor, your great-uncle, were slaughtered in their complacency. Their blood painted the pavement red."

"They were _strangled_!"

"Shush. Where was I-yes, their complacency. And with the Don Angelo dead, his successor buried the same day, that left the next children of Quarto to fight it out. Twins, they were, Durante and Marietta. The girl was born before her brother, although by every law she should have been passed over for the inheritance she still pushed her right, the stupid woman."

"Watch it, that's still my grandmother you're talking about."

"But if she had just given up her claim, the Angelo Family would still exist, and it might have been able to stifle the damn Vongola. Instead, Durante and Marietta split the Angelo two ways. Under Marietta was your line, the Adamo Family; under Durante, the Eva Family, now led by your cousin Maria, Eva the Third."

Dante had met Maria once ever, mostly because of geographic differences. The Eva operated largely out of Milan, whereas the Adamo was based in the Sicilian city of Renatti. He had found her to be an intelligent individual, if very uncharismatic. She was blunt to a fault, and never saw the value in flattery or simple modesty or respect.

Meanwhile, Dante was perfectly civil and well-spoken, which seemed to help little with his efforts to make the family legitimate. He attributed it to bad luck.

"So, my nephew, are you satisfied with your lot in life? Are you willing to let the Vongola go on as they are? Do you really approve of it?"

"Of course not!" He ground his teeth together. "I followed up on that lead you mentioned last month-the Tenth Mist Guardian, it's _him_ , as you said." He grimaced, and his gaze unconsciously flickered to Barbarossa. "But I can't do anything about it. All I can do is hope to not draw their ire."

Giullare set his hands in his pockets. "Come now, Dante, can't you feel it? The world is shifting underfoot. Those who can keep their balance are the ones who will come out on top." He fluorished one hand theatrically. "How does that ring fit you?"

Dante raised his hand to eye level, lingering on the emblem. A delicately painted top-down view of a locust with its wings out, framed by stalks of wheat on the sides, two horns set next to each other on the bottom, and at the top a banner reading 'Angelo' in ornate script.

"It fits me well, uncle," he said. "Indeed, that I cannot deny."

The Angelo had at one time been large enough to rival the Vongola. At the time when Tsunayoshi Sawada was visiting Italy for the first time, there were three living souls in all the world who had once been a part of the family. The first had been declared legally deceased by the Italian courts twelve years earlier. The second was serving ten life sentences plus 460 years with no possibility of parole. The third was Giullare Regina, the advisor to a young Don with a grudge against the Vongola.

"Now then, surely you have time for a quick game?"

"Uncle, you know I'm terrible at chess."

"You'd get better if you tried," Giullare said, as he picked up a chess set he had given to Dante for a birthday a few years back and started setting it up on the surface of the desk. "And it might improve your ability to strategize."

Dante said calmly "But what's even the point of strategy? There was that Swedish fellow, 'No plan survives contact with the enemy', is that not true? So what's the point of planning, take it as you go, isn't it so?"

Giullare gritted his teeth. "You've misunderstood that. Von Moltke wasn't putting aside strategy as a whole, he was an acclaimed _German_ military strategist after all. He was warning against sticking too tightly to a plan, as plans are made based off of certain assumptions and knowledge that may not be certain, given how prone humans are to irrational and just plain stupid behavior. Plans keep things organized and keep chaos from reigning, but when a plan hits the real world, the real world must be accommodated for. Do you understand?"

"Yes, yes, I understand. Fine, a game, then."

* * *

"So how was Italy?"

"It was...it was pretty neat, to be honest. And getting to spend my birthday with my friends was awesome, too."

"Oh, and Lambo-kun, what did you think? I hope you didn't cause any trouble?"

"Lambo-san likes Italy, but I missed Mama more."

"Oh, you're so sweet~ Mwa! Alright, thank you for humoring me, you can go back to your game."

"Apparently he tried to throw my clothes out the window at one point, but aside from that he was fine."

"Oh, Tsu-kun, I'm just so happy. Everything's just coming together. It's so wonderful! Ah! Before I forget-here it is-Happy Birthday! Oh, I can't believe you're already 15, the time just flies by. So, I finally convinced your father you needed a phone of your own. He immediately started looking at the most easily breakable ones."

"Of course he did."

"I suggested something a little more sturdy. With how often he breaks his phones, you'd think he would agree. Anyways: ta-da!"

"Thanks, mom, really, it's perfect, just what I wanted. Oh-that explains Haru's gift, there it is."

"Aw, what a cute little lion charm! Haru's really outdone herself this time. Oh, but look at the time! Go off to school, I'll see you this afternoon!"

"Later!"

* * *

 _A/N: When all else fails, approach the writer's block from a different direction is what I've found to work. Like write Tsuna's birthday party from the perspective of the civilian waitress who is channeling every ounce of frustration from working in the service industry. Unfortunately that means my readers get the pleasure of reading that madness. Pacing will hopefully pick up from here on..._

 _Oh. Right. Our antagonists! Who have a Biblical theme... The Adamo and Eva are actually OCs I've had for a long time, who I've wanted to use in a KHR fic as long as I've been writing KHR fic. A lot of things have changed about them, but just as many have stayed the same. Many characters tied to the family have names that are explicitly Biblical, and others are stealth puns. Dante and his great-uncle Durante are named for Dante Alighieri, known for writing The Divine Comedy. Maria and her great-aunt Marietta have named derived from Mary. The last boss of the Angelo was named Jasper, which is a name given to one of the three Wise Men._

 _Also, I did create the family when I was 15, so expect some of the connections to be...less than subtle. Although the association with divine law, like how in ye olde days royalty was commonly believed to be chosen by God, is a relatively new development. Fortunately, that's a fairly simple family motto to translate into Latin, 'De Virtute fit Iustitia'. From strength comes justice. Make of that what you will._

 _I've just about outlined the rest of Flame of Day, and we're a bit under halfway done. With my tentative outline, we're looking at about 35-39 chapters total. I...will talk about a possible sequel when we get there._

 _Next time: returning to Nami-Chuu and petitioning for justice for his humiliation, Tsuna's first-ever opponent! Target 16: Ippon!_


	16. Ippon

_A/N: There are multiple reasons why updates have slowed down considerably, from having run out of pre-written chapters, to schoolwork, to keeping on getting fixed on a possible upcoming AU to write between chapters of Flame of Day. We'll see how that goes._

 **Chapter 16: Ippon**

With the means to finally get rid of all these slips of paper with people's phone numbers on them, naturally Tsuna did it all at once while he was walking to school, paying so little attention to anything besides programming the numbers into his phone that he ran directly into Shouichi Irie, who to be fair was walking around the corner, also staring at his phone. Both fifteen year old and sixteen year old went down simultaneously.

Shouichi scrambled to pick up his schoolwork while Tsuna shook off the dizziness. "Shouichi-kun! I haven't seen you in a while!"

"Mmmm," Shouichi grunted, holding several papers in his mouth as he collected up the others. Tsuna scooped up a few and passed them over. "Thanks. Sorry we haven't talked lately, I've been busy all over the place. Spanner and I have been emailing each other a lot-he's trying to convince his grandfather to let him attend university in Japan-and I've been working on...but, you don't care about that."

"Working on what? Some new technology?"

Shouichi rubbed the back of his head, and put a hand on his stomach as it twisted in knots. "Ahhhm, no, actually-on my music. After all, even if it won't lead to anything, I still like music a lot." He smiled. "Got a lot of ideas for songs, there isn't enough hours in the day. Sorry, I'm rambling-but, then, how are you? Do anything interesting lately?"

"Well, not really...I mean I guess...my friends and I just got back from a trip to Italy."

"Really? I'd love to go to Italy. Although...I guess it probably wasn't sight-seeing?"

"Definitely not. Although…" And he remembered the first full day of the trip then. "I did get to meet Aria-she's Giglio Nero's Eighth, the ex-Sky Arcobaleno, and she had Yuni with her-they both seem to be doing well. I mean, Yuni's only six months old, but still."

Both thought, but neither said, " _But still, they're alive."_

"That's wonderful!" Shouichi said, brightening.

"Mmhm. It's really good to see, after everything." Tsuna ran his hand through his hair. "But uh...actually, I'm glad I ran into you. Speaking of Aria; she told me when we met that, that Byakuran left the Giglio Nero nearly six months ago. She's concerned about what he's up to, so I was wondering if you knew anything? He seemed pretty attached to you, is why I ask, and I was wondering if you'd heard anything from him?"

Shouichi nearly keeled over from his stomach twisting in knots. "Ah...let's walk and talk, is that okay? You're still going to Nami-chuu, right?" He stuffed the rest of his papers into his bag and threw it over his shoulders. Tsuna took the liberty of zipping it up for him when he left it open. "Thanks. So, Byakuran...yes. He's been e-mailing me, pretty regularly actually, but I don't know where he is. I've tried tracing the IP address more than once, but he's using several proxies to get around it. One day, he sent me a message at 9:00 AM from an IP address matching a cafe in Mexico, an hour later one from a museum in Australia."

"Ah."

"So, if I knew where he was, I'd gladly tell you, he's so erratic and unpredictable-I don't think he'd actually hurt anybody intentionally, but he's also...to be honest, I think he's a sociopath?"

Tsuna recalled how he had nonchalantly blown up a van and seemed little concerned that it had been a civilian. "He might hurt somebody just because they're in the way? Or hurt somebody without considering the consequences of the action?"

"More the latter, I think. Weirdly enough, I think that Kikyo might actually be a good influence on him. Or at least good at convincing him not to run around wantonly. But, back to the subject at hand, I don't know where he is. And I'm guessing he knows that I'd tell you if I found out. Instead, he's just-" His phone vibrated, and Shouichi sighed. "There he is, I bet. Yeah. Most of the time, it's just stuff like this."

He held up the screen to show Tsuna the email chain. He vaguely recognized the short messages as being the notation for moves in Shogi. Tsuna took a moment to resolve the last one Byakuran had sent (from an email address labeled as chalky100 ) of B-5f as moving his Bishop to space F-5. "Wait...are you guys entirely visualizing the games?"

"He is. I'm not." He pulled out a slip of paper in his pocket which had Latin letters indicating the pieces and their positions in pencil. He used his phone as a flat surface to mark the move. "He gets on kicks of different games. And he only ever sends moves, never any messages. I only know it's him because the subject line is..." He coughed. "It's always, uh, Shou-chan. And, um, he's the only person who calls me that."

"I'm the last person who's going to laugh at you about a nickname, Shouichi-kun." He glanced at the penciled board again. "Has that Silver General of his been promoted?"

Shouichi stopped halfway into typing his move to glance at Tsuna then the board. "Uh...no?"

"Then move that Pawn up. Unless I'm missing something, it'll force a capture. If you move up your Pawn, then the Silver General can't capture directly to the side. If he has his Gold General move forward to capture the Pawn, you can grab it with your Bishop over here, and it's not capturable. Same if he goes forward-left, the Silver General blocks forward-right, you can grab with your Knight if it goes right, your Pawn if he goes left, backwards is blocked by his Pawn, and if he moves anything besides the Gold General you can take it with your Pawn."

"But he could take my Pawn."

"So? It's a Pawn."

"That's ruthless, but true," Shouichi said, and marked down the move and sent it off. "Where'd you learn to play?"

"My mom tried to teach me. I'm...not very good at all, it's sheer luck that I noticed that. I never had the patience to learn anything beyond amateur level."

Shouichi's phone vibrated again. He checked it and went a little pale. "Uh...'I wouldn't expect a move like that out of you, are you cheating?' That's the fastest he's ever replied. I wonder..." He sent a reply back: "Tsuna suggested it. Anything you want him to know?" Less than a minute later was Byakuran's next move. "So much for any answers. I'll tell you if anything comes up."

"Thanks. See you around."

* * *

The daily peace lasted for just about an hour. Tsuna was even awake for that hour, although sometime around English class the door to the classroom slammed open and the next thing Tsuna knew his head hurt and he was seeing stars.

"Sawada _Dame-_ Tsuna!" And then he was getting pushed out of his seat and the end of a shinai was pointed at his face. "I demand justice!"

 _Nobody even calls me Dame-Tsuna any more…'cept Reborn but it's sarcastic,_ was all his spinning head could come up with.

"Oi, who the hell do you think you are?" Gokudera said, completely ignoring the teacher's attempts to break up...whatever this was.

"Get outta my face! This is between me and Sawada!"

Tsuna squinted, and for just a moment made out a kendo club uniform. _Wait...that guy?_

"Sawada, I challenge you to a duel, so I can take justice for the humiliation you paid me. I'll take ippon off of you or die trying!"

"Mochida?" he murmured, still trying to break through the fog. He rubbed his eyes and squinted again. He wasn't wrong-Mochida Kensuke, first year high school student, former head of the Kendo Club at Namimori Middle, and strikingly, stood there in the middle school kendo uniform that was a size too small, with dead-looking eyes and ragged from head-to-toe.

"That's it!" the teacher said, snapping her fingers. "Mochida Kensuke, you are supposed to be at the high school! Now you will leave this classroom before I take disciplinary measures."

"Buzz off, I'm not scared of a bunch of delinquents," Mochida said. "This is between me and _Dame-_ Tsuna, a concern of men's honor!"

Tsuna blinked. _Honor? Honor?! I think I stopped caring about honor sometime between the first 'Do it with my Dying Will' and the first time I heard the name Rokudo Mukuro!_ "Now hold on-"

Then Gokudera was right up in Mochida's face. He was dead quiet as he grabbed Mochida by the front of his shirt. In barely more than a whisper, but loud enough for Tsuna to hear even still sitting on the ground trying to get his balance, he said "You will not use that name when you speak of the Tenth; you will call him by his name, or by his title, but to call him No-Good after everything he's done is an insult I won't forgive."

Mochida spat in Gokudera's face.

"You _little_ _ **punk!**_ " There was the hissing of a fuse going, and Tsuna was instantly on his feet and put a hand on Gokudera's shoulder.

"Please, Gokudera-kun, you'll kill him," he hissed. "He's not worth it."

Gokudera looked from Mochida to Tsuna, then with great pain pinched out the fuse. He pushed Mochida back. "Consider yourself lucky," he said, as he wiped off his face.

With no sign he had even registered how near he had come to dying, Mochida took a step back and said "I'll see you in the dojo, Sawada! Three o' clock, don't think to go running off or I'll hunt you down!"

He went storming out of the classroom, slamming the door so hard the glass in the window shuddered, and then the events of the last minute caught up to Tsuna and he nearly sank to the floor and started moaning. Instead, he turned, looked at Gokudera, then the teacher, then Yamamoto (half out of his own seat with his own very real sword in his bag), then the rest of his classmates, all looking at him in stunned silence.

"Did...did I just imagine it, or did Mochida-senpai just come in here and challenge me to a rematch two-and-a-half years later?"

* * *

"Wait, a rematch?" Chrome said, raising an eyebrow.

"Yeah, it was-a long time before we ever met you, actually, now that I think about it. Man, the time just flies under the daily assassination threats, doesn't it?"

"It's why we're here, Tenth," Gokudera said, still steaming about Mochida.

"I was actually talking about Reborn's assassination threats," Tsuna said quietly. "But, actually, it wasn't too long after I met Reborn. I guess, Mochida was the first person I ever fought and beat. Gokudera, Yamamoto, don't you remember him? That stupid duel, half our grade was…" He narrowed his eyebrows. "Wait...I'm trying to remember...no, wait, you wouldn't, Gokudera, this was a few weeks before you came to Japan. Now I remember, this was maybe the day after I first met Reborn. But Yamamoto, don't you remember?"

Yamamoto frowned and thought. "Hm...you said it was two and a half years ago, just after the school year started?"

"Yeah, I think it was like the third week of class or so."

"There you go, I would have been at the Mishimi Invitational," he said. He shrugged. "I have no idea what you're talking about, although I remember that when we came back Mochida was...am I remembering correctly, that his hair was a lot shorter?"

"Try nonexistent," Tsuna said, and went somewhere between laughter and horror at what he'd done while his inhibitions were released. "But, geez, that was so long ago. It was before I'd met most everyone, or if I had it was...well, classmates. Not that I've changed that much, to be fair."

"Really?" Yamamoto said, disbelievingly. "I mean, Tsuna, I'd seen you around school back before the kid showed up, and you were...I just...sorry...but I can't imagine the person that you were back then doing everything you've done. I mean, from Varia to Vindice, it was still you standing up and fighting, right? Special bullets or not, you're still a really different person from then. And I mean that as a good thing! You...you're…"

"A hero," Chrome said, as she tried to hide behind her lunchbox.

"They're right, Tenth," Gokudera said. "I mean-you've always been amazing, no doubt! But there's no day I'm not thankful I stayed resolved, because you became a great leader even more than when we met! Could you have pulled together all those people for a single cause at that time?" He was a little flustered at implying anything had ever been negative about Tsuna, but chilled out when Tsuna smiled.

"Thanks, you guys. It means a lot." _Maybe I was wrong. I guess...change doesn't have to be bad, does it? We've all changed, haven't we?_ He rested his chin on the table. _That dumb kid who met that guy from Italy, he...I wouldn't have stood up and fought without the Dying Will Bullet, and that had nothing to do with deciding to take on all those enemies._

The brief peaceful moment was interrupted by a cheerful voice chirping out "What are we talking about?!" And Tsuna jumped and nearly squawked at Kyoko's arrival with Hana in tow.

"Kyoko-chan! We were just...actually!" he said suddenly, as she sat down on the bench next to Chrome. "Do you remember Mochida Kensuke? The Kendo guy?"

The pressure suddenly seemed to rise a little, and there was a _snap_ as Kyoko accidentally broke her chopsticks in half. She took a deep breath, thanked Hana for giving her the spare set she kept with her lunch, and said "I hadn't thought about him in a while."

"Hey, I remember that guy," Hana said suddenly. "He was that monkey who tried to make Kyoko his prize, wasn't he?"

"That would be the guy," Tsuna said, and sighed. "Well...so, earlier this morning, he walked into my English class, hit me over the head with a shinai so hard I saw stars, and challenged me to a rematch."

Kyoko blinked, and slowly set down her food. "A rematch?"

"Yeah."

"Two years later?"

"Yeah." He tightened his mouth into a thin line, then said "I asked around a little. Apparently, sometime over the past week, he came to Namimori looking half dead, kicked around the current captain of the Kendo Club, and made them all his subordinates in some effort at extracting justice. Specifically, he wants to take 'ippon' off of me."

Kyoko, unlike Tsuna, let a laugh slip, although her eyes were still wide. "Alright…"

"Are you going to give him the same treatment as last time?" Hana said, leaning forward to look at Tsuna.

"Well I can't imagine he's going to get involved with some rematch," Kyoko said indignantly. "Right?"

"Well…" Tsuna rubbed the back of his head. When Kyoko opened her mouth to lecture him about fighting, he said quickly "I'm not going to fight him! But I want to know what's going on, and this could be a good opportunity for it! There's something really wrong here, and he looks horrible. I'm...I think I'm honestly worried about him. He said that he'd get ippon off me or die trying."

"Now hold on, Sawada," Hana said, pointing her chopsticks at him, an inch away from his nose. "You always used to say stuff like that. 'I'll do it as if I were to die', or some nonsensical thing like that."

Looking cross-eyed down Hana's chopsticks, Tsuna said "That's different, that's...uh…"

Hana narrowed her eyes. "It's weird mafia stuff, isn't it?"

There was a short pause as Tsuna processed.

"I'm sorry," Kyoko said, staring intently at her food. "She could tell I was lying when I said we were at a sumo tournament."

Hana just sighed, and shook her head. "Look, just...Kyoko told me far more than I ever wanted to know. As much as it explains, and it explains a lot, just say 'weird magic stuff' and I'll accept that."

"...You've known since we returned from the Future?"

"Was that when you guys all vanished off the face of the earth for a few days?"

"Yeah."

"Then yes. Kyoko wouldn't tell me, I got a few things out of her, then when I went over to your house to beat some, I mean, get some answers out of you," she said. "When I did that, instead I found that one weird kid, and he swore me to secrecy."

"Uh...which weird kid was that?"

"The one in black. Gave me hives for entirely different reasons than usual."

Tsuna closed his eyes. "Right. Of course." He turned and for the first time in this lunch period he looked at the conspicuous cardboard box labeled 'Fragile' in permanent marker and said "Thanks for saying something about Hana. By the way, never got to mention it this morning: your pants are too short again, I could see your ankles."

The cardboard box gave a rumble of discontent, and a shuffling as its inhabitant checked his pant legs to make sure Tsuna wasn't messing with him. He was not, and the cardboard box went sliding away around the corner. On a monthly basis, Tsuna got to point out to Reborn when his clothes were too small when they had just been tailored to accommodate his growth, unaided by the fact that Reborn refused to have them a tad too big to let them last longer. Tsuna found it funny, Reborn just found it annoying.

"So. Right. Mochida. When I fought him the first time, I was under the influence of, uh, weird mafia magic," he said, glancing at Hana. She had her arms crossed over her chest and looked irritated, but she was also at rapt attention. "The Dying Will Bullet, and if you're regretting something when you're shot with it, you die and revive with the Dying Will to accomplish your last regret, and all of your limiters off. Thus the strength and lack of reservation to, um, tear out all of Mochida's hair." He had fallen to a quiet murmur.

Yamamoto snorted and milk came out his nose. "Well doesn't that explain it!"

"You tore out his hair?" Gokudera looked completely lost. "What? Why?"

"Uh...well, I've tried to figure out a lot of times what my logic is in Dying Will Mode. That one, ippon can be either a point in kendo, or counting a single long cylindrical object. Like...hairs. So, when he challenged me to get one off him, I got a hundred off, and the referee was in his pocket so then I got all-off."

"What did I say about men being monkeys?" Hana said quietly.

"And that's how everyone stopped calling me _Dame_ -Tsuna," he finished lamely.

Chrome awkwardly put a hand up. "Um. You said...if you're regretting something. What if you died without regrets?"

 _Not likely, Reborn can read me so well he wasn't going to put a bullet in my head without being certain I'd survive it. Sure he put me in dangerous situations, but before Mukuro the worst I ever got was that stupid birthday party and when Enzio went nuts that one time, and neither of those was really his fault._ He could have said all that, but it was a little wordy, and besides there was another if slightly grimmer explanation.

Before he could stop himself, he said "Reborn is a hitman, after all."

Judging by how pale Kyoko looked, Tsuna realized that might have not been the best way to put it.

* * *

The word had spread rapidly throughout the school, although it was advertised far differently. The most common story was that Mochida had suffered a nervous breakdown after getting kicked out of school. Tsuna had had to calm down Chrome after she first heard that, as she had actually _had_ a nervous breakdown a few years earlier and found the idea of mental illness equals violently obsessive to be offensive.

The gym felt empty despite the buzz that had filled the school day. There were at most twenty people in the gym, including Tsuna's friends, a couple representatives from the Disciplinary Committee, and the Kendo Club, in various levels of fear, concern, and nerves. A few seemed surprised when Tsuna showed up, although the surprise might have been from seeing him flanked by his friends.

The referee approached Tsuna nervously, and in a low voice he said "Sawada, you really gonna do this? Nobody will think badly of you for not wanting to dredge up an old fight."

"That's kinda why I'm here," he said. "Not even Mochida is the type to come running back with an old grudge, it just doesn't feel right, and I want to know what's up. If that means going up against him so he can't hide his true thoughts, then I guess that's the way it's gonna be."

"Geez, Sawada. I guess...just, be careful? He's going all out, told me if I raised your flag he'd beat me up-and, I'd watch that armor, it's weighted down."

"Armor will just slow me down." The referee offered up a shinai. Tsuna took it and frowned. "It's weighted too? Nevermind, I don't need it either."

"Uh, are you gonna go in naked like last time?"

"No, I will not! I'm just better without heavy gear weighing me down." He was going red. _I could live a hundred years and nobody would let me live down those days._ He went for his gloves, but stopped before he could even get them out. _I could really hurt him if I used all my strength, I'd best hold off until I can better gauge his power. Plus...I don't really want everyone here to know I can freely light my hands on fire._

He smiled reassuringly at his friends at the sideline, and took a quick glance through the gym. Unsurprisingly, Reborn was in the rafters, watching and waiting. He had a gun in hand, and raised an eyebrow. Tsuna shook his head, and stepped up to the line.

Mochida looked almost steaming. He had his armor on but had foregone a helmet again. His face was red, his eyes were dark. He couldn't seem to stand still, bouncing back and forth on the balls of his feet, flourishing his shinai. "I'll have it, _Dame_ -Tsuna, I'll take ippon, I'll take my Justice." He stepped forward and his chestplate shifted. Where his collarbone crossed the first rib on the right side, there was a blemish-almost like a tattoo made with indigo ink.

Mochida stepped forward again, raised his shinai, and said "Anything to say?"

"Why are you doing this?" he snapped back. "It's been over two years, you haven't shown a hint of holding a grudge. After all, you were the one that challenged me, that wanted to make a joke out of me."

Mochida grabbed his shinai with both hands and swung as hard as he could at Tsuna. Tsuna saw it coming from a mile away and stepped to the side. A wide graceless sweep and he moved back to avoid it.

"Stand still and take it!"

Every instinct told him to run as fast as he could as far as he could. _And will that accomplish anything? Of course not, it'll be the same as it ever was!_ He dodged a wild swing. _I don't know if I believe I've changed all that much-but they believe it, and I trust them to the ends of the Earth!_ "Mochida, this is a waste of both of our time."

"You're the last person allowed to look down on me!" Mochida swung over his head, and Tsuna blocked it with the flat of his hand. His arm went momentarily numb from the force of the impact.

In the instant that the shinai hit his hand, it flexed, and Yamamoto's uneasy feeling came to a peak when he noticed metal glinting between the slats. Tsuna was still recovering as Mochida went at him again. "Tsuna, watch it!" _There's a trick in that blade!_ Yamamoto dropped his bag and kicked the base of it, the blade tearing through the bag and flying straight at Mochida as he drove forward. _Yarazu no Ame._

The true katana struck the shinai and broke off half of one of the slats before spinning away through the air and sticking in the opposite wall. A gasp went up, first at Yamamoto's stunt, then at the razor blades concealed between the slats of the shinai now very visible.

"What the hell is wrong with you?!" the referee shouted as he threw the flags down on the floor. Mochida turned his attention away from Tsuna for a moment to elbow the referee so hard in the face his nose started bleeding.

Tsuna's eyes widened even as Mochida came for him again, and threw himself backwards to get away. _He's trying to carve me up!_ He pushed himself up and scrambled for the loose Dying Will Pills he had put in his pocket. _And doesn't care who he hurts for his so-called Justice._ He swallowed both pills, and when Mochida came for him next with a wide overhead swing he grabbed the body of the shinai and held fast. As the practice blade flexed, the razor blades were exposed, cutting into his bare hand, but he didn't seem to notice.

Tsuna roughly kicked Mochida away, and with an easy motion snapped the shinai in half. The razor blades, held in place with hot glue, fell to the ground with a clatter.

"Piece of _shit_!" Mochida dove at Tsuna with his hands reaching out, his eyes burning, and Tsuna grabbed one arm and twisted it an an angle hard enough to make Mochida yell out in pain.

Tsuna held him up with one hand, and used the other to lift his chin. Mochida desperately scrambled at Tsuna's arm, trying to get a purchase, muttering "I need...must...must...need…"

Tsuna narrowed his eyes. _His heartbeat is erratic,_ he reflected, reading the older boy's Flame with his own heightened perception. _His eyes...that's not anger, that's just desperation. Pleading desperation to relieve pain. I wonder…_ "Take it, then, if you want it so badly."

Mochida's eyes widened. He reached up slowly, mechanically. Tsuna didn't move, waiting.

There was a brief sting as Mochida plucked out a hair from Tsuna's head. "Huh," he said, and a brief look of relief crossed his face before he passed out dead away, hitting the floor in a heap. The mark on his collarbone evaporated into a puff of smoke.

* * *

"His arm is broken-it's amazing he could even get into a fight like that. But otherwise, he just seems to be exhausted. If he wakes up before I come back, tell him not to move his arm, I'm getting a sling, and he'll need to go to the hospital before the end of the night to get a cast put on it."

"Thank you, miss."

The school nurse walked away to find a sling, and Tsuna spun around and bit the tip of his thumb nervously. He looked up at Reborn and Yamamoto, the latter of whom had helped Tsuna get Mochida to the nurse's office. "I think I accidentally broke his arm."

"You absolutely broke his arm," Reborn said, absolutely not impressed by the feat. "Should I demonstrate how to properly do a joint lock without breaking their arm?"

Tsuna took a step back and pulled his arms in tight to his chest. "Please no. Ow," he added, and checked his hand. Thread-thin lines crossed his palm where the razor blades had dug in. One had started bleeding lightly again at the strain. "Thanks again for saving my neck from that stupid trick blade, Yamamoto."

"Mm, it's what I'm here for," he said, as he cleaned his sword from his seat right next to Mochida's bed, the edge of his blade maybe a foot from the high schooler.

"I don't think he's going to lose it again," Tsuna said carefully. "Whatever that was, a psychological break or something more supernatural, he wasn't himself. I can...feel it," he finished lamely. "Uh, sorry, but I mean, I don't think he's going to attack me again."

Yamamoto was still a little wary, as much as he trusted Tsuna's judgement he also had an implacable protective instinct. He didn't put his sword away, but he did move away from Mochida.

"Supernatural," he muttered. "Oi...didn't Mukuro have a power like that? To control people?"

That had long since occurred to Tsuna. "Yeah. He did-does. His Sixth Path let him control minds. The way Mochida mindlessly came after me, it did remind me of Fuuta that time, but besides being completely different from how Mukuro has operated, I couldn't sense his presence, even though I've been able to since we fought, although I guess he could have been far away…" It made him feel a little sick to suspect Mukuro.

"Impossible," Reborn said, looking a little deflated for it. "I questioned Chrome-she lost the use of the Six Paths when Mukuro got out of prison, but she knew enough that the Sixth Path cannot be used from more than a quarter-mile away."

 _So he does trust Chrome, at least that far,_ Tsuna noted, a little pleased. "Alright. Well, once Mochida wakes up we can see if he knows anything. Assuming he's even willing to talk after I broke his arm, no Reborn you of all people are not allowed to interrogate him, he's still a civilian and you'll go straight for the electric shock." Reborn couldn't even deny that that was his first thought.

* * *

When the cuts on Tsuna's hand re-opened for the third time, Yamamoto practically shoved him out of the office to go meet Ryohei and get it fixed up.

He never got that far. At the front door of the middle school, he stopped in the middle of a step to stare.

Kozato Enma must have felt eyes on him; he stopped in the middle of trying to pick up papers and looked up. His eyes widened. "Tsuna-kun!"

Tsuna shuffled over to try and help him pick up the papers. Not homework; letters mostly, it seemed, most in English. He recognized the emblem on one of the letterheads as being that of a pharmaceutical conglomerate, and no small one either. "The Hidari Group?"

Enma nodded. "Lots of people are interested in Fiamma technology, it's a little overwhelming." He was smiling warmly despite that.

"Yeah, haven't seen you in school lately," Tsuna said. It came out sharper than he intended.

"It's...it's been really busy," he said lamely. "But...going well."

Tsuna thought of his conversation with Don Giegue. "Nice, to hear, I mean."

Enma nodded. "Ah...I'm just here to find Adel, she said she was going to ask Hibari-san some things and...well, it's them, you know? But, I'll see you around?"

"Probably, yeah."

Enma's face fell, and he walked away from Tsuna and made it just inside the front door of the school before he dropped to his knees, put his hands on the top of his head, and moaned. _Stupid stupid stupid, stupid scared coward stupid, how hard is it to say? A lot harder than it seems. "My pride is…"_

* * *

Arm in a cast, held up by a sling, Mochida took a deep breath before knocking on the door of the Sawada residence. He was met at the door by I-pin, who had as of late had grown to look more her age of seven, although Mochida still recognized her from seeing her around town; it was difficult to mistake anyone else for the little Chinese girl in a martial arts hanfu, no matter that she had grown out her hair some which made her head look far less rounded.

"Hi, uh, I'm looking for Sawada Tsunayoshi, is he home?"

She hesitated, then said "Wait, please."

"I can do that."

She ran off down the hall, and came back a moment later. "You can come in."

"Thanks. Uh, _shei-shei_ ," he said, certain he was over pronouncing it. He followed I-pin inside, and when he came upon Sawada and his friends he was nearly turned to stone by the cold killer intent in the room at his arrival.

Sawada was sitting in a chair at the head of the coffee table; on his right was Gokudera, standing in order to point at something on the paper. Next to him was Sasagawa the elder, who Mochida suddenly remembered had a grudge against him for taking potential boxing club members into the Kendo Club. On Sawada's left was the creepy girl with only one eye and _shit shit she's looking at me do not stare you idiot!_ He tore his gaze away and looked at the last, Yamamoto Takeshi, who was a baseball player, although for both being athletes-and, apparently, swordsmen-they hadn't met many times, so most of what Mochida knew was by word of mouth.

"I think you're taking a big risk thinking of yourself as a swordsman," said the child with perfect enunciation and _holy shit is this real?_ "I've got a few methods for testing if you're dreaming."

"Stop that, Reborn," Tsuna snapped, and with a nod he got his friends to settle down. "Mochida. How's your arm?"

"Ah? It's good, I mean, it's broken, but the break is a lot smaller than it felt like it was, orthopod said I can get the cast off in two weeks." Mochida caught a look pass between Sawada and Sasagawa, but couldn't imagine what it was about.

"Yeah, I'm really sorry about that, I guess I don't know my own strength."

"No, don't apologize, wouldn't have happened if I hadn't…" He clicked his teeth. "If I hadn't done all that…"

Sawada rubbed the back of his head. "I have to ask, have you really held a grudge against me all this time?"

Mochida shook his head furiously. "No way, not at all! I mean, sure I was angry at first, but then...well, it kinda made me realize how much of an asshole I'd been, yeah? And really, I'm sorry I acted like that toward you, I really am, there's no excuse for it. It was dumb, and gross, and I was just riding a wave of testosterone that ended with crashing into a wall."

Tsuna avoided laughing at that. "Thanks, I appreciate the apology. But, then, what happened? Do you even remember what happened?"

"Ah...well, from a few days ago to yesterday afternoon, it's a little foggy? But what made me just go nuts, I don't know. I just woke up and was obsessed with taking justice for something I didn't think of as a slight. Like I said, even if I regret how I treated you, I'm glad you kicked my ass, I needed a lesson in humility before I went and did something really stupid. I never thought about trying to take revenge; course, until now I never thought about apologizing, either."

Chrome spoke up then. "When you said it was foggy, can you be any more detailed? Like, do you remember anything? Was it more like being bodily manipulated against your will, or just a fog?"

Mochida was silent for a long while as he considered her, and that nobody around her found it to be an odd question. Of course 'odd' was to be expected around Namimori these days, and since it was usually fairly harmless if a bit weird to see a set of giant turtle tracks in the woods or Sawada playing with his pet lion cub then getting thrown out a window by a little kid- _Was Namimori always this weird? No, it started around...around...around when Sawada came running into the gym wearing nothing but his underwear._ Before he could stop himself he said "Are you guys the ones responsible for destroying the school last fall?"

Sawada looked uncomfortable, Gokudera immediately piped up with "That was a gas explosion, wasn't it?

"Caused by a gang on PCP, I'm sure," he replied sarcastically. "Ugh, neither, like a compulsion to 'seek justice' against Sawada by any means necessary. Thus putting damn razor blades between the slats of the shinai, I don't even _know_ what screwed-up part of my brain came up with that."

"Use sheet metal next time," Gokudera said, and Mochida was quite finished with these guys.

"If you need anything...uh...guess I owe you...not that I'd be much help…"

As he left, Sawada and the others launched into a conversation about Six Paths, and Mochida decided that he would try and keep an eye on Sawada, if not get involved with those violent delinquents he called _friends._

 _Right. Okay, apologize to Sasagawa Kyoko, apologize to the middle school kendo club...hope I don't get bitten to death for skipping school for the past week..._

* * *

 _A/N: Let's play spot the Buffy reference._

 _Now, let's play 'spot the point where the author showed one of her biggest frustrations with the ending of the manga'. As I keep on saying in my rants on tumblr, would that kid from "That Guy from Italy" go so far? Would he have fought Mukuro and for Mukuro? Would he have gone so far for Enma even after everything the Shimon did? Would he have gone so far for the Guy from Italy? Nope. And it's all the change he went through that made him a hero, even if he isn't a flawless hero._

 _Next time: It's a Sunny Friday afternoon! Chapter 17: Funny Sunny Day!_


	17. Funny Sunny Day

_A/N: This chapter has things. Uh...introduction of an OC I've had in mind for a while, at least as long as Kappa. Although the character's function has changed significantly since her creation._

 _Quite obviously the title of this chapter is named for what used to be my least-favorite KHR opening and is now possibly my favorite, at least for song choice? Certainly it's not because the major characters involved all have Sun flames..._

 _You might notice that I regularly go back and forth on whether they are called chapters or targets. There is no significance to this._

 _EDIT 6/16/17: Cleanup, fixing Tsuna's dialogue to sound more like a teenager, changed some descriptions._

 **Target 17: Funny Sunny Day**

Fittingly, the Kurokawa Family owned a flower shop, one started to accomplish a childhood dream of the lady of the house, Kurokawa Hibana, and whole-heartedly supported by her husband Kurokawa Ushio. Their elder daughter, a university student, had been named Kosame after her great-grandmother, and their younger daughter was named Hana, and it had been a source of irritation for much of her life, but she put up with it because unlike half of her friends she actually had a pretty healthy family situation.

They lived in apartment above the flower shop, which was closed this weekend. There was no car, but Hana hadn't said anything to Kyoko about being out of town but wasn't answering her phone, and there was a light coming from a window on the second floor.

Kyoko climbed the steps as she often had, went up to the door, and knocked. Nothing. She knocked again, and shouted out, "Hello? Anybody home? Hana-chan, are you there? It's me!"

A voice from far inside called out in reply, "Door's open!" and Kyoko sighed in relief. She stepped inside, removed her shoes, and shut the door behind her. She followed the direction she had been called from, well-familiar with the apartment that she visited so often. She found Hana in the home office, bleary-eyed and wearing the glasses that she hated. At her left hand was a stack of newspapers, at her right was a laptop opened to a database program.

"Yo," Hana said, uncharacteristically chill, but she also looked rather tired.

"Uh...is this what you've been doing all day?" Kyoko said, peering over her shoulder.

"All day? It's only," and she looked at the clock and swore. "Oops." It was past 3 in the afternoon. "Geez, and I meant to do so much today. Stupid stupid, got caught up in…" She hit the save button, pulled off her glasses, and rubbed her eyes. "Sorry, sorry, did you need something, Kyoko?"

"I was just concerned, you weren't answering your phone and I didn't think you were supposed to be out of town. Though, it looks like your parents aren't home?"

Hana raised an eyebrow, reached blindly across her desk, found her phone beneath the stack of newspapers, and flipped it open. "Eleven calls?" she said, smiling.

"I was worried!"

Hana stretched her arms, stood up, and hugged Kyoko. "Oh, I don't deserve a friend as good as you." She released Kyoko, looked back at her research materials, and sighed. "Yeah, my parents went up to Tokyo to visit sis. I decided to use my free time to feed my latest obsession."

"I thought you were still stuck on One Piece?" Kyoko said, teasing. She laced her fingers together and made a dreamy expression. "Oh, your swirly eyebrows are hypnotic, I could stare at them forever while you cook me wonderful meals~"

Hana went a shade of pink even as she pulled Kyoko's hands down. "I never said anything like that!"

"You did talk about food, though." While Hana was distracted trying to deny it, Kyoko moved closer to the computer. "So, is this a research paper? Hm…" Her eyebrows knit together at the title of one source, "The applications of psycho-empatho-physics." She said it aloud and ended on a question mark. "That sounds like...what in the world is that?"

"Pseudoscience, mostly," Hana said, slowly recomposing herself. "But when you get this deep into fringe science, there's gonna be some wacky stuff."

"Fringe science?"

"Everything from psychic abilities to teleportation to parallel worlds," Hana said, navigating back to the main index. "And, thanks to you sharing generously, I know at least two out of three may be actually something to be considered."

"And you've been looking at this for...how long?"

"Only a few days, since Sawada kicked Mochida around." She rubbed the back of her head. "Honestly, until I saw that, I'm not sure how much I actually believed you. It just all hit home that this was real, and you were getting dragged into it. I can't just sit by and watch. So, I started with this." She brought up a simple Word document with vague notes typed out by train of thought.

"Huh...is that Italian? How do you pronounce it?"

Hana smiled, and put on an air of the dramatic. " _E'la nostra ora incisa sull'anello_. 'Our hour was engraved on the ring.' Did you know Sawada talks in his sleep? And can sleep with his eyes open? Keeps on doing it in geometry. Kyoko, you've got that look on your face. You know the one, when you don't want to talk about something."

"Hm? Oh, I just-I've heard that before, I think, when Tsuna-kun told me everything. He mentioned...but, no, I'm sorry, Hana, I'm not trying to hide things from you again, but it's not my place to tell you about that." Kyoko still shuddered at the thought of that 'Vongola Trial', and how Tsuna had seemed so terrified to remember it. If he said anything about it in his sleep… _Nightmares, maybe?_

Hana made a face, but didn't push it. "Anyways...I figured that if the only ring he wore was that fire-engine red one, maybe that was something special. And then I remembered what you said, about special rings lighting a flame. That's what I've been looking at."

Kyoko perked up at the mention of rings.

* * *

 _ **The previous night.**_

Feet always moving, eyes up, guard set, and most importantly, always go to the extreme.

Back away from a left-right-left hook combination, protect the chin, stay ready and agile.

"You're fast as hell, Kyoko, all those sports did you well," Oniisan said with approval. "I had to train with the worst guy to get the footwork you can pull off naturally." Hook around, blocked with the side of her glove.

It was a bright and sunny day as brother and sister sparred in a square drawn out with a stick. The clearing was open and empty. If Ryohei went all-out in the school, something would get destroyed, and Hibari's affection for the color purple would be appropriate, given that he would be royally pissed.

"When your loved ones are on the line, you have to use everything for their sake, to be willing to go to the brink of death. Do it with your Dying Will, Kyoko!"

"Right!"

Ryohei dropped back, readied his good arm, and set one foot back. He thought of Kyoko being in danger because he had coddled her, of her taking so much emotional strain for his sake, of how she had been training just as hard as he had for the last two and a half months, and could take it and come out even stronger. "Get ready, Kyoko!" She crossed her arms in front of her face. He launched off his back foot like pulling a trigger. " _Maximum Cannon!"_

The force of his blow shining with light kicked a cloud of dust in the air, pushed Kyoko back so hard her feet left ruts in the dirt, but she didn't leave the ground. Her arms had gone numb, there was dust in her mouth and nose, and it felt like she'd been hit by a burning hot truck, but when the dust settled she was still standing, still up and aware and guard at the ready. She was dizzy, but not excessively, and being on total defense was instinct by now.

Her heart was pounding, she couldn't keep the smile off her face, she was breathing hard and everything was sore but everything was really bright and alive. Everything seemed to shine.

And most importantly, she looked up at her brother, a look of awe on her face. For the barest instant, she felt like she had really _seen_ him for the first time, unobstructed by bias and emotions. He was strong, and bright, and passionate all the way to his core. He really was the Sun, like they said.

"I think...I understand why you like boxing," Kyoko said slowly, smiling.

Ryohei laughed aloud, charged forward, and grabbed up Kyoko in a big bear hug, lifting her off the ground and spinning her around. He released her, leaped and punched the air, and yelled out. Kyoko would have sworn he was even happier than she was.

* * *

Kyoko had woken up that morning barely able to move, but still smiling from ear to ear. "Have you found out anything interesting about it?"

"A little. Not much. And of course it's all mafia secrets so it's a bunch of fun trying to get at that, what little electronic information there is…"

The joy flooding Kyoko like sunlight dimmed a little at that. "Hana-chan? I thought you said you were done hacking?"

"Technically they're all criminals, so is it really so wrong?"

"Yes, because criminals won't hesitate to hurt you if they learn you're in their computers." Kyoko shut the lid of the laptop.

"They won't learn about it." Which was actually probably accurate, considering she had learned from her sister, who had been doing it for far longer than Hana had, and never got caught even when she went into systems far less primeval than that of organized crime syndicates. Combination of leaving everything like you found it and just taking information rather than trying to change something, along with using proxies that were usually on computers halfway across the planet; Kosame had quite a lot of friends, and had introduced Hana to them when Hana got involved in 'carrying on the family tradition', as she put it.

Kyoko had learned about it their first year of middle school, when the most Hana was looking at was scans of manhwa and American comics online, and had threatened to tell her parents.

"I still don't like it. Just be careful, please."

"I always am. Thanks for worrying. Now then, want to know what I have learned?"

"Yeah," she said, against her own will. Damn curiosity!

"So! Going off that 'nostra ora', bit, when I look around, it seems like these flame-producing rings-I've seen a few references to the rings being 'Protected by Omertà, but there's nothing that suggests it isn't just a fancy descriptor-tend to be not new rings, but inherited ones. Now you could argue that they were passed down _because_ of that power, but then I found this report made by, hm, here. Some 'Verde', no indication if that's his family name or given name, or probably a penname."

Kyoko paled. She had, once and only once, had the pleasure of meeting the former Arcobaleno, before returning from the world of Ten Years Later, and that had been an alternate version of Verde, so technically they had never met. She had gotten the impression from their short interaction that he wasn't a very nice person. "Hana, you didn't take that from Verde's own computer?"

"No…? Got it off some record from some Yakuza, and considering that it was a horrible scan they probably stole the info themselves."

"Good, good."

"Right, anyways...it's a whole rambling mess, but it's sort of like this: you know the stories about how, if an object is used for a hundred years, it'll gain a life of its own? Basically, it's in the same way with the rings. Running off the fact that ESP apparently exists, and it's like the rings are being engraved with the emotions and memories of those who wore them. That gives the rings a spirit of their own, and produce flames." She held up a finger before Kyoko could say anything against the theory. "You know that ugly ring my mom gave me for my birthday last year? It was a family heirloom?"

It hit Kyoko like a sack of bricks. "No way…"

Looped on a chain around Hana's neck, there was a small copper ring roughly shaped into a lily, with a slight gem in the center. Hana pulled the ring off the chain and slipped it on her finger. Hana breathed deeply, and the milky-blue stone was lit with a blue flame.

* * *

At least this weird mafia guest had some damn manners, even if her Japanese was low level and she read her greeting stiffly off an index card, and referenced etiquette from notes written on her hand. The Latina university student had introduced herself as an acquaintance of Reborn's named Friday Cuellos, bowed deeply, then kissed Tsuna's ring and said "It is an honor to meet you at last, Tenth."

Just as soon as Tsuna was sure she was some subordinate, she had fired off sarcastic Italian at somebody just past Tsuna's shoulder inside the house.

"Ciaossu, Friday," Reborn said.

"Reborn," she said stiffly, and smiled wryly.

"Tsu-kun? Tell Reborn's guest she's welcome to join us for dinner!" Nana called from the kitchen.

"Got it," he said, and clumsily relayed it in English. In both Japanese and Italian she had an American accent, and his English was far better than his Italian.

"Thank you, Tenth, it would be my pleasure."

"You really don't need to speak so formally, just call me Tsuna."

At that she smiled and said "Ooh, I already like you better than that stupid fop."

"Wait, what?"

But he didn't get an answer to that before he got dragged away to put the spare leaf in the table and find another chair, and when he had finally gotten a decent one he returned to an amiable conversation between his mother and Friday in English, so he was completely lost.

"So Friday was just telling us how she works with your father!" Nana said brightly, as Tsuna sat down.

He eyed her and said "Oh, working on construction sites?"

She appeared to choke momentarily, and Bianchi thumped her on the back. She coughed and said, "Yeah, yeah, like you said. Haven't had many opportunities to meet him, but he's interesting."

"So is this your first time in Japan?"

"It is, here on a school trip but when I realized how close I'd be to Namimori I got permission to come on my own for a few days," she said, and Tsuna knew it was a complete fabrication. "Wanted to see Reborn, it's been a while, and hoped to meet the wonderful family Iemitsu loves to gush about. His descriptions do not do you justice, Sawada-san," she said, as she looked to Nana.

"Oh, you're too kind," she said, even as she went red and dreamy-eyed. "And please, call me mammá."

"I also didn't realize you had so many under your care. I grew up with my dad and his family so I know something of lively homes, but I was also the youngest."

Like that was the signal, Lambo used his spoon like a catapult to fling rice at I-pin across the table, and Tsuna was first to react and put his hand out to block it. "Lambo, I get that you want attention, but Friday is talking. If you behave, we can play your video game tonight, okay?" he said as he started wiping off his hand. I-pin shared her own napkin in gratitude.

Lambo had started sulking, but at the mention of the new game he lit up, even as he tried to pretend like he didn't care. "Kay, Tsuna-nii."

"And I got another controller this week, so I-pin can join in," he said, and she smiled. "Fuuta, if you'd like to play we could do loser rotates out." Fuuta didn't particularly like video games, but it never sat right with him to not at least offer.

"No thank you, Tsuna-nii, I'll just watch."

Tsuna nodded. "Sorry, Friday, you were saying something about your family?"

She had been smiling at how Tsuna handled the little kids. "Ah...yeah, my dad and his older brother are both first-generation Americans, I live with them, my aunt, my _abuela_ and my late _abuelo_ , and for a time with my cousins, but the older got married and has his own daughter on the way, the younger is working on her Ph.D. And speaking of cousins," she said, and took a deep breath after the long run-on sentence and looked at Tsuna. "Apparently, we're something of cousins as well, Tsuna."

Tsuna choked on his drink while Nana looked thoughtful. "Through his father, perhaps? I know Iemitsu is some quarter Italian through his father."

"Even further than that; wouldn't know except my mom's family is crazy about pedigrees."

 _Oh for the love of._ "Are you related to Timoteo? Ah, mom, he was the old guy who visited last winter? He's like a way-off cousin of dad's but I called him grandpa?"

"You're right on the nose," Friday said. "He's my great-uncle. You and I are...fifth cousins, twice removed, I think. Through my mother, of course, my dad's family is Puerto Rican."

Tsuna tried to remember the family tree Reborn had shown him once, and decided that the Eighth must have had another child besides the Ninth that wasn't on the family tree for whatever reason. Maybe an illegitimate child? And if she was with the CEDEF, as she had implied, then that would explain why she wasn't a potential candidate to become the Tenth.

"So how long you staying in Namimori?"

"As long as he tells me to," she said, and pointed at Reborn. "I have the honor of owing him more favors than anybody else on the planet."

"Oh, do you have anywhere to stay?" Nana said, leaning forward in her seat. "There's always room for a friend or family member."

Friday shook her head. "I've got a hotel room already, but thank you for the offer, Sawada-san."

As plates began to be cleared away, Tsuna leaned forward and said, "Who was the, uh, 'stupid fop' you were talking about earlier?"

Friday shifted in her seat a little nervously and said "Ah, well-one of the Ninth's kids, actually. The oldest, Enrico? Was press-ganged into being his Sun Guardian when I was like 13, then he kicked it a week before his Inheritance Ceremony."

In an instant, Tsuna was simultaneously torn between _Oh she doesn't have a Sky Flame that's why she isn't a candidate_ and _She was supposed to be the Sun Guardian for a guy she is now insulting after his death. Primo must be spinning in his grave._

In an instant, Reborn had landed his foot in the back of Tsuna's head hard enough that Tsuna went face-down into what was left of his dinner, and got rice stuck around his mouth like a goatee. "A boss doesn't act with a holier-than-thou attitude," Reborn said, ignoring the dirty look Tsuna was throwing him. "Don't forget, half of your Guardians have tried to kill you."

Well used to Reborn's mind-reading trick, Tsuna didn't even bother questioning it. "Wait, no, that is a complete lie, yes Gokudera did but that was your fault, Hibari never actually tried to kill me, that was his future self, and Mukuro...okay, nothing there, he absolutely did."

"Lambo."

"...who tried to kill _you_ , I was only ever collateral damage."

"In my defense," Friday said, "Reborn detested Enrico, too."

"That is entirely beside the point, don't try to change the subject." Reborn punctuated it by grabbing Friday by the sleeve and leaping from the table to twist her arm back. Instead, Friday followed his motion by rolling out of her chair, pulled out of his grip, and came back with a low kick that Reborn quite easily leaped over and kicked her in the forehead.

She was standing up when Tsuna recovered himself and said, "Hey can you teach me how to do that? Get out of a joint lock?"

"Uh...sure?"

"I'll have to get out my more painful methods of restraint," Reborn said thoughtfully.

"...wait never mind I don't want to learn."

"Reborn, you said the middle school gym tomorrow morning? Seeya, Decimo!"

 _She's just as absurd as the rest of them, isn't she?_

* * *

"Nonlethal takedowns. A deceptive term, given that with enough strength, any could potentially be lethal. I'm told you accidentally broke a guy's arm?"

"...yeah…"

As it turns out, Tsuna had been unintentionally right on the mark; Reborn, knowing that Tsuna would rather hold back and get hurt than go full bore and risk hurting someone, had asked Friday to come to Japan to teach Tsuna to improve his skill in hand-to-hand fighting, particularly submission holds.

As he expected of a Sun Guardian candidate, her expertise was in martial arts. She had bragged that even if her skills weren't anything special, she knew how to teach the basics of Judo, Capoeira, and Okitchitaw without needing to resort to Spartan methodology.

After nearly two hours of her trying to teach Tsuna, and him not absorbing it at all, she was practically tearing her hair out.

"If you let me use the Dying Will Pills," he started, and got a boxing glove thrown at his face for his trouble.

"No, if you're going to do it, you'll want to always be able to do it. Unless you can do Hyper Mode at will, you're learning it the old-fashioned way. Can you do Hyper Mode at will?"

"No," he admitted.

She finished retying her hand wraps, adjusted her tank top, and bounced back up onto the balls of her feet. "Àndale, Tsuna!"

"It must be a Sun thing to be this weird," Tsuna muttered. "Well, no, Shouichi-kun isn't that weird, and Daisy was weird but in a creepy way."

"Stop talking to yourself, get up and into a ready position. We're going to spar, I'll try and put you in a hold, and you have to break it."

Tsuna stood up, readied himself, and defended himself as Friday came at him with a low-speed combination while she worked herself back up.

"So, Tsuna," she said, even as she blocked his weak attempt to punch her. "You got a girlfriend?"

"No!"

"Got a boyfriend?"

"Nuh-uh."

"Huh. Well, whomever you're interested in, you're a good kid, give a few years, grow a few more inches and when your voice changes, you'll have them just crawling all over you."

"Well, that's never gonna happen. I hit the genetic lottery, I'm gonna be short, shrill, and smooth-faced for the rest of my life."

It had been Iemitsu who had noticed that Tsuna had already hit his major growth spurt (although Tsuna was still growing but slowly and was currently about 5'6" tall) but showed no signs of, quote, "becoming a man." He meant that Tsuna had no facial hair, his voice was still pretty shrill, and he didn't have a lot of muscle mass.

That had been last spring, and Iemitsu had insisted that Tsuna see an endocrinologist. Tsuna had come away with a diagnosis of Partial Androgen Insensitivity syndrome, and a sense of relief from the anxiety his father's comments about his masculinity had brought on.

Reborn had been quick to tell him not to be insecure in his masculinity, it was unattractive in anyone, and unacceptable in a boss, and anyone who cared about how masculine or feminine he looked wasn't worth listening to. Iemitsu had latched onto the fact that Tsuna would also never have children as a result of the condition. He was probably thinking of how the Vongola bloodline would die with Tsuna, which nobody else cared about, but Nana took it as him wanting grandkids and dragging him out of the room to explain the idea of adoption to him, but not before giving Tsuna an embarrassingly big kiss and making sure he was feeling okay.

After confirming that Tsuna identified as male and that he didn't experience any distress over his condition, the doctor had recommended against hormone replacement therapy, which Tsuna was alright with because taking androgens would have required talking to a psychiatrist.

Of course, with the way his life went, the 'psychiatrist' would be Reborn in a stupid costume.

Friday didn't press for any details on his comment, and Tsuna wouldn't have shared if she did. Instead she just said, "Oh? Good, your father's beard makes him look like a hobo."

As Tsuna went for a punch, she grabbed his arm, turned him around, latched her arms around his shoulders, and locked her hands together behind his neck. Tsuna pulled, groaned, tried to kick her, and finally she released him, made a noise of disgust, and said, "Alright, let's go, we're taking a lap."

She went to the door of the middle school boxing club room, opened it up, and stepped outside in shorts, a tank top, and no shoes in pouring down rain in late October. He groaned, and she said, "Well, if you don't like it, you should try harder, hm? Once around the school, twice if you don't hurry it up!"

Tsuna very reluctantly followed after her, and was forced to keep up with her pace that for her was a good jog and for him nearly a sprint, through puddles of ice-cold water, and yet the thing he was most afraid of was that Hibari would come by the school and bite them to death for being on school grounds on the weekend. At least his shoes wouldn't be wet.

They also went just around the building, instead of running along the fence, so he was only in so much pain from running when they returned to the gym, but she just picked up her workout towel, wiped her face off, and got back into position immediately.

He groaned, but just got into position anyways, dripping wet. He'd need to clean up afterwards, lest he incur the wrath of the Disciplinary Committee. He put his hands up, and Friday came for him again.

"No offense, but I'm still wondering why Reborn didn't just teach me himself."

She raised an eyebrow. "Cause he's still under two feet tall?"

"He's still able to beat me around despite that."

"Well, that's different. Generally, if you've got as much skill as he does, the amount of actual strength you need to inflict pain is minimal, it's about putting them into an unnatural position. But-" She grabbed his wrist again, but this time he instinctively pulled back as he yanked his arm back against the side her fingers were on, and she couldn't hold on. "Excellent, you're getting it, maybe there's some merit to getting a little Spartan after all."

"I wouldn't really call one lap in the rain Spartan."

"Whatever. It's negative reinforcement. Anyways, chances are, you're not going to be fighting opponents of his size, plus he just doesn't have the ability to put you in more than a simple joint lock. He's still in the body of a two year old, y'know?"

"But-" He got distracted, and took a punch in the jaw, it had almost no force behind it but it surprised him. "Ah-but he's been able to do crazy strength stuff! He's pulled me up stairs, beat up me and my friends once and that included uppercutting my, um, my Sun Guardian so hard in the chin, it was a Knock-Out."

"You and your Guardians fought Reborn?" she said, slowing down her movements in order to process that. "Geez, I can't imagine what that must have been like.

"Anyways-he sorta explained how he can have superhuman strength once, but it was really vague and I had to watch him punch out a hitman coming after the Bronco to understand it. I'm not too good with this Flame stuff, but I know enough that what it is, it's kinda like, time out for a second."

They backed away from each other. She held out her arm. "It's like a rebound effect, almost. Like, pushing the flame within his body into his core, and releasing it with a hit so that the energy snaps back in place like a rubber band and increases the power behind the hit to something inhuman."

Tsuna sort of thought he understood. "That might explain it. I wonder, maybe it's a power granted to the Arcobaleno, so that they could defend the Pacifiers? If not, that actually sounds kinda useful…"

"Ah, you're losing me on Arcobaleno stuff," she said, waving her hand. "But as for the Flame Rebound, it's less useful than it might sound. Extremely inefficient, just eats up stamina like hell. I'd rather be adult-sized. And thus, we lead back around to the original topic."

"He can't teach me how to do nonlethal takedowns because I'd need somebody else as a practice dummy, anyways."

"Something like that."

She cracked her knuckles and launched into another attack, this time kneeing Tsuna, kicking low, and grabbing his arm, spinning him around, and locking her arms under his elbows. This time, Tsuna dropped to the ground and grunted as he nearly rolled forward to throw Friday off and down flat on her back on the mat.

She leaped back up almost instantly, grinned and said "Excellent. You're learning. Now, let's speed it up a little."

Tsuna nearly whimpered as he rubbed his shoulder to try and get the pain out.

Speeding it up meant kicking it up significantly, and whenever Tsuna took a hit he also had to do pushups. They had started at 8 in the morning; at noon Friday allowed a longer break, and then smacked him when he started drinking water like mad. "You'll make yourself sick."

Tsuna already felt pretty sick. He pushed his water away. "How are you able to do this?"

She shrugged. "Well, I enjoy it. Getting energy out. Honing myself."

"So, are you like Basil? That is, my dad's, um, apprentice, I think, he's fully combat trained, are you like a bodyguard?"

"Nah. Truth be told, I'm only barely associated with the Consulenza, but getting a paycheck from them is enough to get those guys back in Italy off my back. I'm just a contact in the States; if somebody from the Family is in California, I'm expected to be available as a translator and guide, but fortunately I don't have to deal with the old men too often."

"You dislike the mafia just as much as I do, don't you?"

She looked grim. "I'd heard you were stubborn about your position. But for good reasons; mine tend towards the personal."

"What do you mean?"

"Well-" she shifted uncomfortably. "I'd rather not go into it...but it comes around to not liking the kind of people around there. Racist old men, mostly."

Tsuna recalled the advisor who had verbally abused him, and then what it might be like if he weren't a candidate to be the successor. "Jeez."

"Yeah. So, when Reborn suggested I get a job with the Consulenza and they could only pull me to Italy in an emergency all-hands, I just leaped. But, I'll admit-if you were the Tenth, I wouldn't mind being around more."

"Sorry, I'm not-"

She waved him off. "I know, I was just speaking hypothetically."

Tsuna didn't believe her for a second, but let it pass.

* * *

Tsuna downed two pills, but kept his gloves unlit even as they came into being. At Friday's suggestion, he had kept his hand wraps on, although he wasn't much a fan of how they restricted his hand movement. The X-Gloves VVG were already more like gauntlets, but even then still allowed him full range of motion.

He looked up and noticed Friday staring at him. "Sorry," she said. She finished wrapping her hands.

He flexed his fingers. "Can't do the Zero Point stance with my hands wrapped...then again, shouldn't have to, here."

"First to put a knee on the ground loses, hm?" she said.

Tsuna readied himself, and Friday made the first move. And suddenly, he realized just how slow she really was. In an instant, his hand had snapped out, grabbed her wrist, he moved around her and kicked out the back of her knees, and she dropped instantly.

Reborn appeared, held up a sign reading '1-0' with the Japanese and American flags in the corners, and said, "You almost looked like you knew what you were doing for a second, _Dame_ -Tsuna."

Friday still looked a little stunned at how quickly Tsuna had beat her. "Jeez, is that Hyper Dying Will Mode?"

Tsuna let his flame be extinguished, and offered a hand. She took it, and he helped her up off the mat. "I'm just fast. That's the one thing I've got going for me."

"Well, I guess you won-"

"That's hardly an assessment of his abilities," Reborn said. "Most of his enemies can move at superhuman speeds."

"Then what would you suggest?" Tsuna said mockingly despite the sinking feeling he was getting.

"Let's even the field, then." Tsuna and Friday both turned to question that, and Reborn had a pistol in each hand and a smirk on his face. He fired, and a bullet struck home in each Tsuna and Friday, and they fell to the ground simultaneously.

 _I'll learn as well as I can, then,_ Tsuna thought, in the instant before he hit the ground, and without a moment of hesitation he was back on his feet in Hyper Mode.

Without delay, Friday kicked herself up onto her feet with an intense Sun flame burning on her forehead and energy leaping through her body. " _REBORN!_ I'll test with my Dying Will!"

"So she has a manic type Dying Will Mode," Reborn mused. "Round 2, start."

Friday came for Tsuna again, and was faster than before. He grabbed her wrist again, but this time she had the strength to turn her hand over, grab his wrist in turn, and punch him in the chin while they were close. She pulled her main hand free, rocked back and forward, and chopped at his clavicle with the side of her hand. Tsuna dropped back to avoid it and got a grip on himself.

I _t took me crazy Spartan training to get control of Dying Will Mode, and this is the first time she's been shot with the Dying Will Bullet?_ He dodged her flurry of blows, and breathed in. _No...she's able to still use her skill because it's instinctive, but she's expending her energy rapidly just like I used to. She's got years more experience than I do, but I've got a better handle on my Flame._

He raised his hand and caught her incoming punch and twisted her arm. She made no indication of feeling it, only whipped forward with her other hand-he grabbed that hand as well, and she forcibly dropped her arms and got in close, locking both of their arms in place.

 _Now I really wish I could dislocate my shoulders on command-no, wait, she's not wearing shoes._ He stomped down on her toes with his heel, and she loosened her hold in pain. He backed up and put his hands up, ready for the next attack.

Friday steadied herself, and dropped into a lower stance with her knees bent.

Tsuna took a bare moment to assess his opponent. Her flame had grown more dense, but was smaller as well.

It wasn't until a few months earlier than Tsuna realizes just how much more in tune with his Dying Will Flame he was than most of his allies. He had mentioned one morning a few months earlier an unsteady rhythm in his own flame (it turned out he was on the verge of a cold) and had received blank stares in return from Gokudera and Yamamoto. From what he could tell, in everyone their Flame Waves reflected their current state, it was how he had been able to catch Reborn bluffing during poker. Heart rate, breathing rate, illness, general injury, all of it affected how the flame was produced and emitted in the body.

By looking Friday over for a moment, he could imagine a gauge like in a video game determining how much of her 'Dying Will' she had left. And when she was about to leap again, he could catch her heart rate increasing, and was able to drop, grab her arm as she punched, twist it around to her back, and push her to the ground.

Friday struggled a moment longer, then finally relaxed as the Dying Will time ran out. Tsuna released her, and returned to his normal state.

"Geez, did you really have to go for my feet?" she said as she sat down and checked to make sure none of her toes were broken.

"Sorry, did it automatically." He pulled his gloves off, and Reborn seemed satisfied, so he started getting his hand wraps off.

"Nice work," she said, nodding. "Keep practicing, and you'll be a lot less likely to accidentally break bones."

"Thanks," he said flatly. He rolled his shoulders out. "Hey, do you know how to dislocate your shoulders on command?"

"What?"

"Ah, while back, there was this guy, saved me-twice, actually, never got to thank him for it-apparently he's Reborn's friend, but he avoids the question every time I ask about the guy in the suit."

Friday opened her mouth to reply, closed it, and looked over at Reborn. He was very pointedly doing gun maintenance. "A guy in a suit?"

Tsuna nodded, looking a little bashful. "Yeah, I know, descriptive, but my head was also kinda spinning at the time-anyways, at one time he was fighting my dad, my dad sealed his arms like you just did, and the man in the suit dislocated both of his shoulders to get enough freedom of movement to smash my dad in the face with the top of his head. It was…" He was getting a little red. "Don't get me wrong, I don't usually admire people for fighting ability-but I can't help it, he was really, really cool. That, and just like, his whole ability to read his opponent when nobody else could, and his shooting skills-he was using a _pistol_ and could blow a boulder to smithereens and make the fragments spell out 'CHAOS', it's so impossible I can't even believe it really happened, and I really want to ask how he got so good, y'know?"

"Uh-huh. Somebody's a bit of a fanboy." Tsuna didn't seem to notice that Friday was on the verge of falling over laughing, or that Reborn was hiding his face with the brim of his hat, which only made it more difficult to hold it back when Friday noticed it. "Right, I'd say step one is dislocating your shoulders in the first place, and learning how to put it back in place yourself, once it's been dislocated in the first place it'll be more prone to it. Wouldn't you agree, Reborn?"

"Sounds solid enough." Leon turned into a hammer, and Tsuna turned a little green. "It shouldn't be too difficult to knock your shoulders out of the socket."

"Please no."

"Stop complaining and hold still."

"No!" The hammer landed as Tsuna moved back, into the base of his ribcage, and he bent over wheezing. "That was not my shoulder."

"You have nobody to blame but yourself," Reborn said, even as Leon returned to his shoulder as a chameleon.

Friday laughed at it all. _It's even better than I'd heard, these two. That kid's attitude must be contagious, even if Reborn's always put on a devil may care attitude, he's so much more relaxed around this kid than I would have ever thought possible._

* * *

17 Years Earlier

It was her first trip to Italy. She was six and a half, and knew no Italian, but her mother Aurelia Cuellos nee Avenicci assured her that everyone at the party knew English for business.

Less than two minutes after entering the ballroom that was just chock full of gangsters, a blonde-haired man from the Consulenza knocked Friday on her butt as he went running out of the room.

"Guess his wife went into labor a little early," Aurelia muttered, as she pulled Friday back to her feet and helped her dust her dress off. "Least he didn't run out screaming 'My wife is having a baby' and paint a target on them. Are you alright, my dearest?"

"Yes, mamà."

"Good, good." Aurelia took a glance around the ballroom. "Ah...ah-ha, perfect. Dearest, I need to go talk to one of my friends. How about you go make friends with that little boy over there?" She pointed, and was unaware of the look of disgust on the face of the suited one-year-old drinking grappa. Of course, she hadn't been to Italy since her daughter was born, so as far as she knew he was just somebody's kid, same as Friday.

"Okay, mamà."

Aurelia kissed her daughter on the forehead, and left to go talk business with people who would make derogatory comments about her race to her face, and Friday walked over to the corner her mother had pointed out.

She stopped about four feet short, then backed up a foot when Reborn glanced at her, closed his eyes, and offered a silent prayer to dedicate his life to whatever God could strike down that damn advisor for insisting that he attend Enrico's birthday party for no real reason except Grimaldi detested him and wanted to embarrass him. The prayer went unanswered, sadly.

"That's not grape juice, is it?" she said, in a tone meant to confirm her assumption, looking at his glass but kindly not pointing.

He weighed his options, and finally said, "No, it's wine." A very high proof liquor, actually, yet it still could not get him even slightly buzzed, unfortunately, although perhaps it was for the best. Reborn would probably be an alcoholic, otherwise.

"You're not really a baby, are you?"

And as usual, children were smarter than adults. Although maybe it was just because children were better able to accommodate something weird entering their worldview. "How did you know?" he said, a little sarcastically.

"Well, my mamà said that kids can't drink adult drinks, only adults can."

Or maybe it was the underdeveloped rationality.

"Also...like, a hunch, sorta? Um, to be honest, you're kinda scary, mister. Not scary in a kid way, like scary in a really scary way."

"Then why are you still here?"

"Ahm...well, it feels like I'm not really the target of it? I mean, I don't like it when people do baby-talk at me, and I'm six-and-a-half, so I guess you probably really don't like it?"

Okay, maybe not a bad sense of reason.

"I like your lizard," she said after a pregnant pause. "He's really cute."

"Don't say that, you'll spoil him." Leon had already crawled off his hat, down his arm, and onto the edge of the chair seat and presented his head to Friday.

"Can I pet him?"

"Better, he'll get upset otherwise."

Friday took a few steps forward, reached out, and rubbed Leon under the chin. "He's smoother than my cousin's snake."

"He's a chameleon, and a juvenile besides."

"Does he-" She rapped herself on the side of the side of the head with her knuckles. "Sorry, mister. I was gonna ask if he knew any tricks, but lizards don't really do tricks."

Reborn considered the girl for a moment. One must keep in mind, he had rejoined the Vongola less than five years previously, and had largely kept out of the eye of society since then. Enrico's 18th birthday was the largest social gathering he had been to in fifteen years. So it was yet a little uncommon for anyone to refer to him as anything of an authority, let alone call him 'mister'. Maybe he was a little starved of human contact, but at least Friday wasn't being a complete idiot like half the Ninth Generation Guardians.

He clicked his tongue, and Leon came to his hand and morphed into a hand fan, then a ball, then a mallet. Friday lit up, smiling big. "That's so cool!"

"Are the children having fun over here?"

 _Count to ten and breathe, whatever you do don't murder him._ "Grimaldi, I thought you were busy kissing up to Enrico," he said to the Ninth's chief internal advisor.

"I thought I'd come check on the kiddie table, Reborn." Grimaldi's smile was stained by tobacco. It wouldn't be for another decade that he got them chemically whitened. He looked at Friday and sneered. He spoke to her in Italian first, then when she gave him a blank look he repeated it in heavily accented nearly incomprehensible English: "And what is this? Another annoying infant here to take time out of the Ninth's day?"

Friday stood up straight, looked him in the eye-he actually relented for a second-and said, "I'm Friday Cuellos, and I'm six and a half years old, the daughter of Aurelia Cuellos, granddaughter of Junia Avenicci, and great-granddaughter of Vongola Ottavo! Who're you?"

Grimaldi momentarily choked on his drink, then collected himself. "Ah, you're one of those branch girls. So it's true what they say, the bloodline of Vongola grows darker with every passing generation."

"I...um…" She realized suddenly the meaning of what he said, and pulled her arms in close.

"I'm sure Xanxus would enjoy hearing that crack," Reborn said quietly. Even at the age of nine, Xanxus was fiercely defensive of his half Greek heritage, or at least he did not appreciate derogatory comments about it.

"Damn infant, how about you just-"

Friday had recovered herself by then, and inspired by Reborn distracting Grimaldi, she tried the same, albeit in a much more appropriate fashion for an actual child. "Hey, gramps, why is your nose so big? Did you lie about something?"

Grimaldi unconsciously covered his wide nose, sputtered incomprehensibly, and walked away cursing in Italian.

Reborn was about to say that he didn't need to be defended, then he looked over, saw that Friday was making a face at Grimaldi, and let it go as a child being a child.

"Uh-oh, no, my mom's gonna get in a cat fight, I gotta go hold her earrings. It was nice to meet you, Mr. Reborn, thank you for putting up with me."

"Hn. Don't call yourself six and a half. You're going on seven."

"Oh? Okay, thanks then, I'll keep that in mind. See ya!"

* * *

"Don't think you'll never have to kill anyone."

Tsuna felt a little ill at that reminder. He paused in the middle of setting out his clothes for tomorrow, turned, and looked at Reborn.

"I asked Friday to come teach you so that you wouldn't look like a fool with no control over his own strength. That doesn't mean you can get away with fighting without your full strength."

"Right. Because ruthless Tenth Boss of the bloodiest family."

"Because when the time comes and you have to choose between killing an enemy and letting them kill you, I won't allow you to hesitate and die for stupid reasons."

"Got it."

"Do you really? Do you think Primo got where he did by never killing? By showing mercy to people who had wronged him again and again?" Tsuna wasn't the only one who could back himself up by citing the First.

Tsuna hesitated at that. "I...was he really like that? A killer?"

"Not nearly to the degree of his successor," Reborn admitted. "And I can at least respect his methods-he killed quickly and efficiently when it was required of him, and according to his memoirs took no pleasure in it, but neither did he let the lives of all manner of depraved individuals lay guilt on him."

"Oh." Tsuna wasn't sure if that affected his view of the First, or if it did, if it was for the better or the worse. "I guess...I guess I can understand that." Tsuna suddenly wondered if Reborn ever felt guilt for the people he had killed-certainly, as a hitman he had to have killed before. And working for the Vongola, even under the relatively benign Ninth, they might have not all been wicked people. Most of them might have even been innocent. But he didn't ask about it.

That night, Tsuna had nightmares of people lined up against a wall begging for mercy, and one by one being executed by a man in black without a face. It made him toss and turn all night, but by morning he had forgotten what it was about.

* * *

 _A/N:_ _HC Dying Will Flame attributes for characters with no confirmed flame in canon? Not including the games. Kyoko is a Sun like her brother. Haru has a Lightning Flame, I-Pin is Storm, Hana has a Rain Flame, Fuuta is Mist. As for OCs, Dante di Adamo, his counterpart Maria di Eva, and Giullare Regina are all Sky, Friday Cuellos is Sun, Kappa is Cloud._

 _Thank you everyone who has reviewed thus far, I am always happy to receive them no matter how short or long they may be. I know there's a lot of people following just from the traffic stat that I will continue writing no matter what, but reviews give me motivation to write more. Wink._


	18. The Flame of Day

**Target 18: The Flame of Day**

"Alright, alright, I screwed up on the last one, but this time, I'll get the Decimo." His red hair was slicked back with entirely too much hair gel. "Don't fear, boss, I'll bring about justice, and the Family will rise again."

" _Ezekiel,"_ the letter had read, " _I trust you like no other, my friend. It is time for us to make our move, to strike back against the disgusting Vongola and their power. We must cut off the head, and burn away the raw flesh so it does not grow back. I have found the Vongola successor, a teenage boy in Namimori, Japan. You will find Sawada Tsunayoshi, and give him Justice. De Virtute fit Iustitia. Sincerely, Adamo Terzo; your friend, Dante."_

"De Virtute fit Iustitia." He looked up to the sky, breathed in, pursed his lips, and said again with tears springing to his eyes, "De Virtute fit Iustitia."

* * *

"Hammurabi."

"King of Babylon in the ancient Middle East. Created the Code of Hammurabi, a code of law based on eye for an eye retribution. Significant for being the first written code of laws."

"Mesopotamia."

"The land between the rivers, where the Babylonian Empire and many others came out of. Really fertile land because of the rivers."

"And what were those rivers?"

"...probably not the Yangtze and Yellow but that's all that's coming to mind."

"Not even close." Reborn pressed down the plunger and the explosion was enough to make a crater in the ground. Tsuna somehow stood back up and returned to a meditative position while not losing his hold on Hyper Mode. He had wanted to try something new with his Flame, but he also had a history test on Wednesday, so they had come to a compromise.

In reality, Reborn was quite pleased when he learned that Tsuna was trying to improve himself even without an imminent threat, it spoke well of his growing maturity. Though he still insisted he wouldn't become the Tenth, he still acknowledged that there could be a point where he has to fight again, even if the last six months had been fairly peaceful.

Tsuna stood with his hands open and out, radiating a soft Sky Flame, as he tried to test his theory for why he had felt a weird sort of 'resonance' when he had fought Friday the day before. Something that had reacted to her Dying Will, different from when he had fought Basil, or Enma, or his father.

"The rivers are the Tigris and the Euphrates. Additionally, Mesopotamia is called 'the cradle of western civilization'. The writing system that came out of Babylon?"

"Cuneiform."

Tsuna breathed out, and in his mind's eye saw the energy in his body like a river with a single tributary joining it. Tsuna opened his eyes and lit his gloves with flame.

At the core was the same soft orange flame; on the borders was a sparkling yellow flame leaping with untapped energy.

"So the resonance was because I have a Sun wave," he said quietly. He turned his hands over, and the orange flame went out as the Sun flame covered his gloves.

"Could be useful for hiding the Sky Flame," Reborn remarked.

"I guess so." Tsuna took a deep breath, and the flame on his crown was shot through with gold, and his eyes turned two shades of yellow. _It's projected differently, from either the Soft or Hard Sky flame. More chaotic. No good for flying, or projecting._ He dropped out of Hyper Mode, sat down cross-legged, and said "My thought was to try and integrate the Activation property into the Sky Flame. I know it's possible to use a flame's property without a box weapon. Lal was able to use the Tranquility property when she fought Ginger Bread, and the Flame of Wrath is so destructive because of the Storm's Disintegration factor. But then again, it was an inborn ability for Xanxus, and Lal had to use the pacifier to use that ability so I guess it might have just been inherent to the Arcobaleno…?" He tilted his head and peered at Reborn to emphasize the question.

"Your theory isn't wrong. In either respect. The others did gain and lose that ability with the Curse, but I could use the Sun's Activation property long before I was cursed."

"Really? How'd you learn to do it?"

"I nearly died."

Tsuna paled. "Of course."

Reborn paused to pet Leon under his chin. "I'd rather not say exactly how it happened, but it ended in Leon emerging with wings and healing my injuries with stored-up Sun Flames. After that I could light a flame from my bare hands and use the Activation quality at will."

"Huh." Tsuna frowned. _Rather not say...that's a weird way to put it. Normally he'd just say that it was none of my business and hit me. Why would he rather not admit…_ "Did you make a mistake?"

Reborn shifted on his feet. Tsuna would have sworn he looked uncomfortable. "That's one way of describing it. Maybe I'll tell you about it eventually."

Tsuna remembered who he was speaking to, and scooted back a foot. "Don't, don't worry about it, doesn't sound like my kind of story-I mean, it's none of my business, right? Right."

"Exactly. Now then, brink of death." He raised his gun and Tsuna was backed up shrieking in protest. Reborn smirked, and lowered his gun. "Fortunately, you may have a better option."

"...The Dying Will Bullet?" he said, since for two and a half years the Dying Will Bullet had been the solution to all of life's problems.

"No." Leon turned into a cricket bat, and Reborn used it to smack Tsuna in the head and shouldered it. "The Zero Point Breakthrough. Until now, the way it worked is relatively obscure."

"Not really, it's like-" and Tsuna swept his arms around and brought his hands in like he was compressing the air between them. He frowned. "Like-okay, maybe you're right." He got hit again with the cricket bat for the transgression.

"I was referring to why compressing the flames produces ice, and ice that absorbs ambient energy, as well as how you're able to convert absorbed energy into a useful form; box weapons with that ability are specifically made to convert different frequencies of Dying Will Flame into the appropriate frequency. It's technology, not biology."

Tsuna snapped his fingers in understanding. "The Harmony factor! It's unconsciously using the Harmony factor to neutralize and convert Flames, so I could maybe use the same principle with Sun Flames-gotta try it now and I don't care what you say."

He took two more Dying Will Pills, and set himself into the stance for the Revised Zero Point Breakthrough. His flame barely even flickered before settling down, he didn't need to hit the right timing, just had to focus on bringing out the Sun Flame instead of the Sky Flame.

That same chaotic, wild energy leaped through his limbs and charged between the gloves. Tsuna opened his eyes, and they had turned yellow.

Anyone looking at the forest that afternoon would have seen a flash of gold in the distance.

* * *

When Gokudera got a call at four on a Monday from Reborn, telling him that Tsuna needed him to bring a first aid kit and a sleeping mat out to the Death Mountain training ground, Gokudera was only too eager for it. He had packed up a backpack and headed out immediately, and was at the training ground before 4:30.

There, he found Tsuna laying facedown on the ground, bickering with Reborn, who was sitting on his student's head.

"Uh…"

"You came quickly, good," Reborn said succinctly. " _Dame_ -Tsuna's lost his walking privileges and has to camp out here tonight."

"Hnnngh," Tsuna groaned. "Even if you didn't suspend my walking privileges I wouldn't be able to move…"

Gokudera was immediately upon Tsuna, checking his temperature, his pulse, and would have checked his blood pressure had he thought to bring a sphygmomanometer. "Tenth? Are you alright? Should I call a doctor?"

"Mm fine, sorta," Tsuna said, mostly into the dirt. "I just...did a thing without knowing what would happen…" He tried to turn himself over, and wasn't even able to do that for lack of energy in his limbs. His entire body felt like a lead weight. The only reason he was not panicking over being unable to move for lack of energy was that he had experienced the same thing half a dozen times while training in the Future, it was just a consequence of burning a high amount of Dying Will Flames in a very short time. "Tried to see if I could put my Sun flame into my Sky flame, think I like...sped up how quickly the flame was burned off? Without me meaning to. All my stamina just went...poof." He smiled like an idiot, and his head turned over a little. "Poof," he said again, giggling.

"Tenth, are you sure you don't need a doctor?"

"He'll be fine soon enough," Reborn said dismissively. "A few hours sleep and he'll be back to normal."

"Haven't been _normal_ in a few years…" With great struggle, he pulled himself onto a mat, though he was already covered in dirt, and was out like a light.

Gokudera pulled away. Tried to. Tsuna was holding his arm like a security blanket. He was definitely asleep, but that didn't seem to matter, he was still trying to pull Gokudera closer. "Tenth, could you let go, please?"

"Mmmph."

Gokudera was already uncomfortable, then when he leaned forward to try and get a better angle to slip his arm out, Tsuna wrapped around his chest and leaned into him, smiling contently. Gokudera started turning red. "T-Tenth," he said, his voice cracking on the stutter. "Reborn-san, could you, give me-Reborn-san, please stop laughing."

Reborn wasn't laughing, but he was close. "I was under the impression you wanted personal attention from the boss."

Gokudera resisted the instinct to shoot him a dirty look, an instinct that had only gotten worse since learning that Reborn was, in fact, older than him. He braced himself and pulled away from Tsuna as quickly as he could, but fortunately Tsuna didn't try to unconsciously lunge after him, just curled in on himself.

"Thanks for the help, gramps," Gokudera said venomously, and regretted it immediately when Reborn took a step forward.

"What was that? I couldn't catch it over the sound of you being a hundred years too early to think you can get away with insulting me."

"Nothing! Nothing at all, sir!"

Barely a moment passed before Tsuna had rolled over, grabbed Reborn and pulled him close, hugging him like a teddy bear.

There was dead silence as Reborn rapidly went red, but for entirely different reasons than Gokudera.

Tsuna woke up a few hours later complaining of a bump on his head, and Gokudera told him what happened in hushed tones. Monday night was a little painful at the Sawada House.

* * *

"Proof here...symmetric principle, definition of parallel lines...assume a 90 degree angle...wait, can I assume a 90 degree angle? I think so…" He picked up his notebook and started flipping through the pages. "...Crap, no I can't. Okay then, symmetric property, parallel lines...right, right, angles formed by a line intersecting with a pair of parallel lines...means that it's thirty degrees here and sixty degrees here…"

Tuesday afternoon, Geometry homework, then more studying for the History test tomorrow.

I-Pin tugged at his pant leg. "Tsuna-san?" She held up her book of fairy tales that she was going through to learn Japanese.

"What's giving you trouble?"

She pointed at a word she had lightly underlined with her pencil. He put the book on his knee so they could both see it, 雪. "That's snow, it's usually read as 'yu-ki'. You see the 'rain' radical in it?"

She nodded. "Thank you, Tsuna-nii-san." She went back to her own seat to copy it down."

"How's yours going, Fuuta?" Tsuna said, to the boy coloring at another seat at the table.

He held up a half-finished picture of a cityscape. Tsuna recognized the Eiffel Tower first. "We're doing pictures of our hometowns for art class."

"That's really good, Fuuta. Maybe you could go back to Paris, one day."

Fuuta smiled brightly, and returned to coloring in the lines. He was in fifth grade, which meant that his classes were worth about nothing in the long run, but he enjoyed being around other kids his age who weren't connected to the mafia. And between the elementary school being only a block away, and the number of people hunting for Fuuta having decreased significantly in the last eight months, he felt comfortable leaving the house.

Also, he had agreed to have a tracking device sewn into both his shoe and in the band of a watch, at Reborn's suggestion. It had weirded Tsuna out a little, but since Fuuta was aware of it, it made it a little less weird. Although it _had_ made him paranoid that Reborn had put a tracking device on him while he was asleep, but that just turned out to be a zit on the back of his shoulder.

"Hey mom, didn't you say you were going to be registering I-Pin and Lambo to start school?"

Nana came out of the kitchen with Lambo clinging to her leg. "Registration starts on December 1st, then we just need to get the adoption papers finalized before the school year starts."

"Mamma, mamma," Lambo said dreamily, smiling big.

"Tsu-kun, don't let me forget, both Lambo and I-pin need their five year booster shots before starting school, sooner rather than later. And flu shots! Everyone needs flu shots at some point, the sooner the better!"

"Already got mine," Bianchi said, stepping out of the kitchen. "Mamma, I need to run to the store, we need fresh shrimp and chili powder to make dinner."

"Oh? We're out of milk, too, Tsu-kun, if you have a minute could you go with Bianchi and give her a hand?

He set down his pencil on the table, grateful for an excuse to get away from his homework. "Yeah, I can do it." He grabbed his jacket and followed Bianchi out the door.

* * *

Watching Tsuna and Bianchi go down the street were three brothers in their twenties, all men of ill repute, all of whom had done time for theft and got out after serving their time peacefully, due to the circumstances which had landed them in trouble in the first place, and it was all because of Sawada Tsunayoshi.

At least, that's what the oldest brother Ichirou insisted when he showed up at his younger brothers' place of employment, a grocery store, grabbed both of them, and insisted with a broken look in his eyes that they had to seek Justice against the boy who had put them into such a shameful position.

The younger brothers were equally torn between listening to their brother both because he was their brother and because he was being really scary, and just wanting to living better lives, as Ichirou had insisted they do after they got out of prison for their crimes of petty theft as opposed to his crime of grand larceny which got him an appropriately longer sentence. Given that he only made about $2000 with study material scams and the first time he had been arrested, it was still a rather light sentence.

"Get going you idiot, you're still a criminal, now act like it!" Ichirou hissed. One of the lenses in his glasses were cracked, his suit was ruffled, and he looked like he hadn't gotten any sleep in a few days.

The youngest brother, Saburou the pick-pocket with his greasy hair once hanging in his face now cut shorter for a more professional appearance, tried to give a weak smile, but couldn't hide his anxiety. He glanced at the boy passing by. He rubbed his eyes. "Yes, b-brother."

"It's your opportunity to make up for your mistake; together, we will have Justice for what that boy has done to us!"

"Right, b-brother."

"Is that guy still following us?" Tsuna said quietly, carrying the bag with a quart of milk and chili powder in one hand.

"Naturally," Bianchi said, rolling her eyes. "He's probably a pickpocket, has you marked for an easy target. Want me to teach him a lesson?" Of course she had brought along poisoned cupcakes.

"No, I've got an idea. You go over to the stand, I'll go around the block and meet back up with you."

There was a spark of curiosity in her eye, but she did as he asked. Tsuna kept walking, and a minute later the pickpocket caught up with him and knocked into him from behind; it was almost embarrassing how bad the pickpocket was, Tsuna could feel him fumbling for his wallet through a stuttered apology.

"No problem," Tsuna said cheerfully, when the pickpocket had backed off. "Oh, you dropped this." He tossed the pickpocket's own wallet at him. "And this." Cell phone. "Wouldn't want to lose these." Car keys. "Don't let the police officer see you with this." Pocket knife. "Have a good day!"

Saburou grew increasingly flustered at the boy threw his own possessions back at him, and realized that Sawada had taken it all off of him without him noticing as Saburou fumbled to get his hands on Sawada's wallet.

Then he looked down in his hands, and what he thought was the kid's wallet was a folded piece of paper. He looked up, but Sawada was already gone. He rubbed his eyes, put his possessions away, and opened up the paper.

 **SUCKER** **ツ**

Saburou's jaw dropped. He threw down the paper in disgust and rubbed his eyes as he returned to his brothers. He sneezed, and said "The kid lured me, put a note in his back pocket, and he, he, _a-choo!_ Ah, hell, hell! There's something in my eyes!" He rubbed his eyes with his sleeve, but it didn't help. "Shit, it's like pepper or something!"

The middle brother Jirou was quickly upon him to try and help, while Ichirou tugged at his hair in anxiety, threatening to pull it out completely, muttering incomprehensibly all the while.

* * *

"You noticed that he rubbed his eyes as a nervous tic, so you lured him into taking a note that had chili powder rubbed all over the paper," Reborn said with a threat of a smile.

"Yeah, I kinda feel bad about it, but he won't try to pickpocket anybody anytime soon, right?"

"You're finally getting rid of that pesky conscience, I'm impressed."

Tsuna whimpered. "You approve of it? No, no, no, I went way too far…"

"Don't believe him when he says he feels bad about it," Bianchi said. "He was giggling to himself when he told me what he did."

"I did not-damn it." Tsuna nearly planted his face in his food, he was so exasperated with himself.

* * *

Even the next morning, Saburou's eyes were a little red, but that didn't keep Ichirou from dragging Jirou out and telling him to seek Justice against Sawada.

With much pain and hesitation, Jirou lifted his pot onto his shoulder and took up a fast walk following Sawada and his two friends on their way to school. More potential witnesses, but Jirou had quick fingers maintained by doing yoyo tricks in the park on Sundays.

He came up behind them quietly, pushed past the two friends, and with a well-practiced movement he bumped into Sawada and let the pot fall to the ground, and it shattered on impact. "Oi, oi, kid, watch where you're going!"

"Hold on, you're the one who pushed past!" Gokudera shouted out, grabbing Jirou by the shoulder and prepping a stick of dynamite. "You'll apologize to the Tenth for your rudeness, or I'll blow your damn head off!"

"Now, now, Gokudera, I'm sure he was just in a rush," Yamamoto said calmly. "It was nobody's fault, hm?"

Jirou had caught the look of murder in the eyes of both boys, and all of the color drained out of his face. "I...I…"

"No, he's right, I was walking right in the middle of the sidewalk," Tsuna said, just to keep it from becoming a problem. He pulled his backpack off. "I'm so sorry, sir, I need to get to school, but if I could give you my phone number I can make sure you're compensated? Is that alright?"

"A-hem! Y-yes, that should be alright…"

As Tsuna searched for his phone, having yet to memorize his own number, Jirou took a step forward as though losing his balance, and Tsuna backed up and dropped his bag.

"Oops, sorry about that." Jirou bent down to grab the bag, and as he did, his off-hand went for the intricate ring he had seen in the side of the bag. Just as he started to pull it out, Gokudera had a hand around his wrist as tight as a vice, and Yamamoto just as quickly had a hand applying painful pressure to his shoulder. "Gah!"

"Can't let you take that," Yamamoto said quietly, his smile gone.

"You're nothing but a petty criminal," Gokudera spat. "Tenth, what do you want done with this pickpocket?"

Tsuna sighed. "That's the second in as many days. Just let him go, you've already scared him, and we have to get to school."

Jirou was losing feeling in his hand from the tight grip, it only hurt more when Gokudera reluctantly released him. He pulled away from Yamamoto, and went running so fast in the opposite direction that he kicked up a dust trail in his wake.

Tsuna sighed, and picked up the Vongola Ring from where it had been dropped. "Geez, I'll just have to go back to wearing this stupid thing, won't I?" He slipped the rings onto his right hand easily. Admittedly, despite how large and ostentatious the ring was, it made him feel a little more comfortable to be wearing it on his hand instead of on a chain around his neck.

"Tsuna, aren't you a little worried?" Yamamoto said, raising an eyebrow. "You said that was the second pickpocket to target you in two days."

"Freaks thinking that physical appearance is all that matters," Gokudera muttered.

Tsuna shrugged. "Ah, well, it's not like either of them actually hurt me. And neither had any resolve to do it, either. I'll just need to keep an eye out, in case it happens again. Come on, I want to study for that history test a little more."

Meanwhile, Jirou had run back to his brother and stopped only long enough to tell him that Sawada was a good kid surrounded by weirdos, he needed to let it go, then shot back off to return to work at the grocery store.

* * *

That afternoon, Ichirou roughly adjusted his tie, only succeeding in making it more ruffled. He had forgotten his briefcase, but he wasn't thinking quite clearly. "I'll have it, I'll have it, I'll have my justice, I swear it." He scratched at his collarbone, where an indigo mark was printed like a tattoo.

That kid, he had embarrassed him and his brothers, chased them off to the police station. Him and all those weird people around him. The Three Brothers in Crime, caught by a thirteen year old in his boxers. No matter if after the kid had been arrested for public indecency that he had suggested that they try and find more legitimate jobs, even pointed his younger brothers toward a grocery store that they were now finding success and contentment working at. Ichirou would steal from Sawada, and have his justice.

He came up to the door, knocked roughly, and put on his best salesman smile.

The door came open to Sawada, and all thoughts of organized justice appropriate for the crime went out of his head at that boy just standing there, having lived in peace all this time. Ichirou growled like a wild dog, lunged forward, and wrapped his hands around Tsuna's throat.

Tsuna tried to tear Ichirou's hands off his throat, but the man had an unnatural strength besides having fifty pounds and six inches on Tsuna. "H-help," he choked.

"My justice, my justice…"

The Sky Ring glowed, and Nuts came hurtling from its surface and bit down on Ichirou's arm. His grip loosened for a bare moment, just long enough for Tsuna to gasp for breath, dig his nails into his arms, and kick at his legs. Ichirou grunted in pain as Tsuna drew blood on his arms and put his heel into the base of his toes.

A shot rang out, and Ichirou slackened, and fell to the ground. Reborn came down the stairs. "It's fortunate your mother isn't here."

"Oh please don't be dead," Tsuna muttered, bending down. The assailant was still muttering to himself and twitching, alive thank god.

Reborn jumped up and kicked Tsuna in the head. "It was a flame shot, over-stimulating his brain so that it temporarily shut down. He _is_ only a civilian, after all."

"If he's a civilian, then who-hey, hold on a minute! You're that swindler, with the study materials! And the pickpockets, those were your brothers!"

Ichirou's hand twitched, as though he were still trying to come after Tsuna. His eyes were dead. "Must seek...have that Justice against that kid…"

"Another one muttering about justice," Reborn noted. "That can't be a coincidence after Mochida."

"Yeah, I know."

Ichirou tried to reach out for Tsuna again, but Tsuna grabbed his wrist and barely had to apply any force to keep him away. _I don't know what's going on with this guy, and I don't know him even like how I knew Mochida, if it's really the same effect. But that trick Reborn did gives me an idea._ "Nuts, go get my pills off the table, okay?"

Nuts growled, and bounded away to do as asked.

"We could stand to keep him for questioning."

"He's in no state to be questioned, and anyways, his heart rate is through the roof even after you made him drop, it could kill him to be in this state much longer. Thanks, Nuts." He swallowed two pills, and took a deep breath. His Sky flame became shot through with yellow.

With a touch, he could harmonize with the assailant sufficiently to get a read on his physical condition; and with a careful application of Sun flames…

He pressed his fingertip to Ichirou's forehead, and at the point of contact there appeared a unique amber flame with sparks of light throughout. Ichirou went stiff as a board, and relaxed just as quickly, his eyes becoming unfocused. The Harmonizing Sky Flames spread the effect of the Activating Sun flame evenly through his body, disrupting his focus-and, though Tsuna didn't know it, disrupting the hold that the mark had over Ichirou's mind.

"A disruption technique," Reborn noted, "And one requiring very little energy."

"Mm." Tsuna returned to his normal state.

Ichirou's eyes refocused, locked on Tsuna, and he scrambled backwards. "Ahh...ahh...you're that kid...wait, wait…"

"You probably should go apologize to your brothers for forcing them into your campaign for Justice."

They were only petty criminals, after all. After Tsuna got arrested for public indecency that time and was put in the same cell as the thieves, he had somehow talked the youngest out of punching his face in.

 _Tsuna adjusted the shirt he was given; it was several sizes too big, but it was better than being in nothing but his underwear, and it would still be a while before his mother showed up. "Have you guys considered going straight? Getting a non-criminal job?"_

 _It was the oldest who grabbed his brother's shoulder, shot him a warning look, and said "And where would you suggest somebody with a criminal record get a job, hm?"_

" _Hakaba Market?" He flinched, even though they had not moved an inch. "My mom shops there; one of the owners is an ex-con, he has yakuza tattoos and everything. He hires a lot of ex-criminals. Since you're just pickpockets, you might have a good shot."_

 _The oldest brother was still looking warily at Tsuna, but seemed interested all the same, and spoke to his siblings in a hushed tone. Within ten minutes, Tsuna's mother had shown up practically glowing when she learned he had taken on the thieves, and they got a long lecture from her while Tsuna got changed._

Ichirou looked from Tsuna to Reborn, back to Tsuna, and nodded. "I don't know anything about what made me go nuts...Just woke up the other morning and was obsessed."

 _Truth,_ his intuition said. "You're welcome, by the way."

"Thank you?" Ichirou seemed to decide then that the best way to show his appreciation would be to get out, and he took off running presumably to go beg forgiveness from his younger brothers.

"You don't need to say it, there's somebody after me." Tsuna sighed. "I took a look at his youngest brother's ID, they're the Honzai brothers. I'll talk to Chrome about taking a look at the eldest, since it looks like he was the only one being influenced to petition for justice, but I'm betting he knows as little as Mochida did." He ran a hand through his hair. "Probably an ESPer that's responsible…"

"Whoever it is, they aren't particularly competent or knowledgeable," Reborn said. "Given that they seem to be influencing people who have reasons to have grudges against you, but their choices of Petitioners are Mochida Kensuke and the Three Brothers in Crime. Mochida gave no issue, and you had the situation under control even before I interfered."

"Thanks, by the way. He, um, got me by surprise. Nobody is more mad about it than I am at myself."

"Obviously. I'm not going to deliver a punishment when you already had somebody try to strangle you today."

Tsuna brightened. "Oh, thank god, I was just trying to play the pity card, but if you're-" Reborn grabbed his wrist and twisted it behind his back; Tsuna slipped out of it and got hit with a stun gun that had him on the floor in an instant.

"I said I'd get out the more painful methods, didn't I?"

"Why..."

* * *

 _That Night._

Heat, he could handle. It was the cold that paralyzed him to the core.

Snow, even ice, could make it okay, winter was fine, it was the cold that destroyed him. When rain set in, and the temperature dropped, he, too, dropped.

And like anybody would care about a boy alone in the cold, don't you know what he's done? What he's capable of? It'll be better for everyone if we just leave him.

He closed his eyes, breathed out, and the icy fingers ran through his chest.

And then there was something _warm_. He just had the energy to open his eyes, and saw amber.

No, wait, he was awake this time, and there really was something amber, and the room was comfortably warm, and Tsuna was making Sky/Sun flames dance across his fingertips to the awe of Lambo and I-pin. Judging by the fact that they were on either side of Tsuna under the covers, they were taking advantage of the fact that the boy produced heat like a furnace on this peculiarly cold October night.

"Ah, geez, sorry," Tsuna said, when he realized Reborn was awake. He extinguished the flame. "It's all I can do, make it appear on my fingers. Sorry, I'll cut it out."

"Thought of a name for that yet?"

"What?"

"You and your Guardians are adamant about naming your techniques. I assumed you would jump on the opportunity."

"Oh. Well...I had one bouncing around in my head, but I don't think you'll like it. Since it's Sky and Sun, I was thinking of calling it the Flame of Day?"

"You _are_ an idiot after all. But I'm just as much one for assuming 'a flame made of hope' was a one-time deal. Tch, do as you will."

Tsuna smiled, and the amber Flame of Day grew dense, and went out in an instant.

* * *

 _A/N: And we have our title!_

 _It occurred to me, that in the present day of this fic, within the category of 'People who use Dying Will Flames', there's actual a pretty sizeable proportion who can use their own body as a channel to produce flames; they don't need a Ring, or another item (like Chrome's trident/spear), or Hyper Dying Will Mode, although they may be more effective with such. However, as time goes on and more people use Flames, that fraction will decrease. In my own little universe, it requires resolve, practice, and a whole lot of natural talent to light a Flame with only their own body. At this point, among the living that is limited to Tsuna, Timoteo, Xanxus, Mukuro (Fourth Path), Reborn, and Bermuda._

 _Next time: stones, suits, and nights; Target 19: Black._


	19. Black

_New cover image created by the wonderful Wyrvel, they deserve all the love and you should go read their fic because it's excellent._

 _A/N: From here on out, if a piece of information comes solely from the Reborn wiki, expect me to interpret it in my own way. In particular, the heights of child characters who were originally drawn chibi, specifically the Arcobaleno, Lambo, and I-pin. Lambo and I-pin are both five years old when they are introduced, and the wiki said they were 42 and 45 centimeters tall originally. The one-year-old Arcobaleno tend toward 40-41 centimeters tall. The average length of an infant at birth? 50 cm. I have since gone back and edited 'Rainbow Curiosities Part 3' to reflect this revelation. Namely, that the Arcobaleno were made into effectively newborns, albeit with better motor control (a wizard did it), which is the only way they could possibly ride on a teenager's shoulder or head. Four months after the curse was removed, Reborn was just about two feet tall, equivalent to a one-year-old._

 _Note to aspiring fanfic writers, the Reborn wiki is poo-poo._

* * *

 **Target 19: Black**

Tsuna gently knocked on the door of the Reception Room. It came open under his hand. "Um…" He pushed it open a little more, and found Hibari and Kusakabe on either couch on opposite ends of a travel-size Go board. Hibari looked bored, Kusakabe just looked frustrated and thankful for the distraction.

"You're here for that information on local disturbances, right?" Kusakabe said at Tsuna's entrance.

"Yeah, that's the one."

"Just a minute. Excuse me, chairman."

Kusakabe left the game to get the requested information. The Disciplinary Committee was, as it turned out, excellent for gathering information on local occurrences, like possible Espers new to the area. Hibari had agreed to put his secretary to work collecting the data.

Tsuna took a few careful steps forward and glanced at the board. Black, that is, Kusakabe, was losing pretty badly.

"You play?" Kusakabe held out the file.

"Not for a while." Tsuna put the file away in his bag. "Maybe try the lower right-hand corner?"

Kusakabe glanced back at the board. "What?"

"Like, here." Tsuna took a black stone and set it in place in a relatively unoccupied zone.

Hibari glanced at Tsuna, and took his turn without a word. Tsuna took another turn, and they went back and forth ten times. Finally, Hibari picked up the edge of the board and slid the stones off to start a new game. "Sit down."

"Uh…"

Kusakabe nodded encouragingly. "Please, you'll be a much better opponent, Sawada-san."

"Right…"

Tsuna sat and picked up the loose black stones and set them back in the bowl.

They started playing, Tsuna playing first with black. Hibari held his stones like a real Go player, with his index finger holding it in place on the nail of his middle finger; Tsuna hadn't played in awhile, he just pinched them between thumb and forefinger.

Tsuna first solidly took territory on the right side, but Hibari came back and took the lower left hand corner, along with ten of Tsuna's pieces after a clumsy ladder. Hibari continued his momentum into the left and upper-left side. Tsuna took the far middle, and the center.

As Hibari considered his move, Tsuna glanced at the file he had been given; it was only three pages. "This is it?" he said.

"There are three known Espers currently in Namimori with active abilities," Hibari said, speaking for the first time since the game had begun. "None have reason to attack you, Sawada Tsunayoshi." He placed a white stone, and Tsuna came back and captured three. Hibari frowned, but made his next move anyways.

"Chrome, Fuuta, uh...oh, Katou Julie, I guess?"

"Precisely," he said, and set a stone just so.

Tsuna experimentally tried picking up one of his stones between his index and middle finger, and managed to keep it in place long enough to set it down. Hibari immediately captured two of his stones on the opposite side of the board.

"I'm starting to understand your dislike of illusionists," Tsuna said. "Don't know where the next attack is coming from, or even if there's going to be another attack."

"Their 'attacks' are nothing more than the bites of insects."

 _Insects? They don't even merit herbivore status. Or he's just making a metaphor._ "I can't help but worry they'll get worse, as this guy gets more desperate. Two attacks have been blocked already, right?"

Tsuna looked over the board as his turn came up again. "Pass."

Hibari said nothing, but he nodded, which Tsuna took as an indication that he, too, passed, and was ready to count up the score. Tsuna took a couple minutes to count up first his territory, then Hibari's.

"By my count, Hibari-san wins by twelve-and-a-half points," Tsuna said, looking up.

"Hn."

Tsuna felt like he should say something, as much as he knew that Hibari didn't tolerate idle chatter. "Good game, then. Maybe I could come by another time, I enjoyed it. I've got a full-size wooden board at home, if that...sounds good…"

"After class, tomorrow."

Tsuna nodded, and Kusakabe escorted him from the reception room. He shut the door behind them, and said "Thank you for playing with Kyo-san."

"Hm? Sure, it was nothing."

"For being nothing, there sure aren't many people who would do it." He shook his head. "If there's anything the Disciplinary Committee, or the Foundation, I suppose, can do to help you, only ask, Sawada-san."

 _The Next Morning…_

Lambo was running around without any pants on, I-pin had already broken a plate trying to chase him down, Fuuta had made a mess doing rankings of the best place to buy fresh fruit at the market for Mamma, Tsuna had gone skidding down the stairs on his face, and Bianchi was cooking breakfast.

Reborn was adjusting his tie in the upstairs bathroom mirror, and couldn't help but smile at the noise coming from downstairs. "Altro giorno caotico," he said, 'Another chaotic day', but it was said fondly.

He froze in the middle of the motion, staring at himself in the mirror.

He had always liked his own eyes. Reborn had never met, hell, heard of anyone with eyes quite so coal black as his own, and they were the one thing familiar for the past thirty years, when he looked in the mirror and saw a child's face.

Even after accepting his fate, he had never mentally pictured himself in this body. His mental image was still of a twenty-five-year-old man, and he wasn't the only one of his team to think like that.

But the mirror image wasn't quite so unfamiliar now as it had been. Certainly his features weren't quite as angular as they had once been and would be, but certainly some of the baby fat was coming away. He had grown twenty centimeters in the better part of a year. And he just _felt_ better than he had been in a long time. Without the Pacifier draining on him, without the knowledge of his eventual fate weighing him down, everything just came a little easier.

And now…

Tsuna saw Reborn enter before anyone else, and acknowledged his presence with a grunt. He piled food onto his plate and carefully stepped into the dining room, watching to make sure he didn't step on Lambo again.

"Chaos," Reborn said, and Tsuna dropped his plate.

"Good morning," Bianchi said sweetly, and returned to eating her own Poison Cooking.

Tsuna looked like he was about to start screaming. To be fair, Reborn had also nearly shouted aloud when he realized that he could finally pronounce the 'ka' row sounds properly.

"It's not Ciaossu, but Chaos?" Reborn said, with a glint in his eye. "Right?" He had a wily smile on his face that was much the same as when he had asked Tsuna for a favor-like he was trying desperately to not break out laughing.

Tsuna was turning beet-red. He forced himself to look away and start picking up pieces of the broken plate. _Step one, murder Reborn, make it look like an accident. Step two, move to Russia, start a pig farm, never see another infant as long as I live._

"Tsuna, you should really acknowledge somebody when they talk to you," Bianchi said between bites of food.

Unbidden, the thought came, _Lesson One: Acknowledge Iemitsu._ He grabbed Bianchi's plate, whirled around, and threw it straight at Reborn's head; Reborn had drawn his gun and shot the plate out of the air without flinching. Leon was looking at Tsuna. Tsuna was pretty sure the chameleon was mocking him.

Nana's voice floated out from the other room. "What was that?"

"Sorry, mom, dropped another dish."

"That's why I get the ones on sale," she said in resignation.

Tsuna picked up his backpack and the rest of the pieces of his plate. He dumped the pieces, turned to Reborn, squinted at him, and groaned. "Just...just...oh screw you!"

On his way out, Tsuna slammed the door shut so hard it rattled.

The first three hours of the school day were pretty much a wash.

Tsuna had forgotten his lunch at home, so he was hungry. And he had a nice big audience. Not only were Gokudera, Yamamoto, Chrome, and Kyoko present, but Ryohei had come down from the high school to eat lunch as was becoming his habit, much to the Disciplinary Committee's disdain, and Midori Middle had a half-day leading up to exams, so Haru had snuck in to eat lunch at Nami-chuu.

"Yo, Tsuna, you've been distracted all day," Yamamoto said, as Tsuna nibbled at a bit of food Haru had insisted he have out of her lunch.

"Mm? Ah...it's just…" He ran a hand through his hair. "Man...he really was super-cool," Tsuna said in resignation.

There was a long pause, but Yamamoto got it first. He was grinning. "No kidding, I just about yelled when the kid released his curse. How'd you figure it out?"

"He walked downstairs and said...said…" Tsuna furrowed his brow. "Wait a minute, you knew it was him? That…that the guy in the suit was Reborn?" He felt a little ill saying it out loud.

Gokudera looked ill; he dropped onto his knees and planted his forehead into the ground in full dogeza. "I'm so sorry, Tenth!"

"Wait, wait, you knew too and didn't tell me?" He looked up, and saw all guilty faces-except for Haru, she was going red. "How?! Why?!"

"Well, the resemblance is a little," Chrome said awkwardly. "It's uncanny…"

"A suit and a pistol, really? By that logic if my dad dressed up in an orange hoodie and gloves you'd think it was me!"

"It's been just over seven months," Yamamoto said thoughtfully, "I think we actually did Prince is Right rules, though, closest but not over, so that means...I think it's Tsuna's dad at six months who won." He pulled a face, looked over at Tsuna's confused expression, and coughed. "Oh, uh, y'see…"

"There was a bet," Haru said, finally getting ahold of her burning cheeks. "To see how long it would take Tsuna-san to, um, 'make the connection.'"

Tsuna blinked, groaned, and fell on his back. "That's it, I'm moving to Russia to be a pig farmer. Calm down, Gokudera-kun, it's alright. I'm just…"

"If it makes you feel any better," Yamamoto offered, "You should have seen the kid's face when you started talking him up, getting all starry-eyed, he was just barely keeping himself from going red."

Tsuna groaned again. "I was fanboying over Reborn! This sucks!"

He sat back up and knocked himself on the head. "I just...How?! It's just...he's a completely different person! I'm always the first person to recognize him in a stupid costume, but the only other one is Dino!"

"Like Dokuro explained," Ryohei said, nodding. "He was still dressed the same, and had the same aura besides!"

Tsuna rubbed his forehead, hoping he wasn't getting a migraine. "Damn it. You guys and the clothes, I swear-"

"He was pretty recognizable from the hat," Haru said quietly.

Tsuna opened his mouth, held up a finger, considered it, and then fell back again. "What do you think the chance is that he'd react badly if I called him ojiichan?"

"Very high," Gokudera said quietly.

"Better than calling him a child," Chrome said. Although it was Mammon she had mistaken for a normal child, picked up, and asked where their parents were, the same principle probably applied.

Tsuna sat up and grimaced. "Man, I kinda feel bad about the baby jokes. I mean I've figured for a while now that he wasn't a normal child, but I just assumed it was more like...Lost Boys than Detective Conan." He flexed his hand, imagined the weight of one of the pacifiers around his neck, and shuddered at the idea of being reduced to an infant. And he was _Dame_ -Tsuna, fifteen years old, not a twenty-something infamous as the greatest in his field. No wonder Reborn seemed so angry when he was referred to as a child.

"You're taking this a lot differently than I'd thought," Yamamoto observed. At Tsuna's questioning look, he continued: "I was imagining more angry yelling, for one."

"Wait, why?" Tsuna sat up with his legs crossed. "I mean, it's annoying, and embarrassing, yeah, but…" He shrugged, and he pushed away the voice in the back of his mind insisting that his friends thought he was an idiot and were getting their kicks betting on how stupid he was.

"But you still have a grudge against your dad for lying," Kyoko said, and Tsuna got even more embarrassed that his dislike of his father was that obvious.

"I've got a grudge against my dad for more than lying. Lying, leaving, visiting twice ever, trying to crush me with a boulder…" He muttered the last one. "But, this? It's not really earth-shattering and I just got embarrassed over it, nobody got hurt because you guys had a laugh."

"I'm sorry, what was that last one?" Haru said, leaning forward.

"Only thing getting hurt today is his pride," Tsuna said, as he looked at the cardboard box marked 'Zerbrechlich', 'Fragile' in German. A little smug, he said "I never got to mention it this morning, but your right pant leg is an inch shorter than the left, jiisan~"

Yamamoto went into a coughing fit, Gokudera spat out his drink, and coming from the opposite side of Tsuna as the box, a foot collided with the back of Tsuna's head sending him sprawling.

"But really," Haru said, "What was that about your father trying to...crush you?"

Reborn landed and checked his pant leg. "I'm going to have to teach that tailor a lesson…"

"Please don't," Tsuna whimpered. "You'll just scare him off, ojii-" And he got glared at as a warning, and he put his hands up in surrender. "Okay, okay!"

Haru was silently fuming, looked at Kyoko and Chrome but neither seemed to have registered what Tsuna had said, and planted her hands on her knees. She put on her biggest most ditzy smile. "I'm good with a needle and thread, I make all my own costumes after all! I could fix up your clothes, Reborn-chan, I mean, Reborn-kun. I can even stitch them loose so they're easier to adjust the next time you need it!"

"Thank you, Haru, I'll ensure you're well compensated," Reborn said, as he stole Tsuna's food.

"Mm, that's alright! I'm always happy to do some work for a friend; I've got some free time today, Tsuna-san, bring over a some of Reborn's clothes after you get out today-oh, and measurements, too."

"Wait, why me?"

"The boss should take care of their associates," Reborn said, not even bothering to look at Tsuna.

"Oi, sounds like more of an errand boy, old man!"

* * *

"I just can't believe this," Tsuna said, as he sat cross-legged on the chair in Haru's room as she got to work.

Haru's room was a small one with only a twin bed, and just covered in art supplies, but since she had known immediately where her sewing kit, good needles, and button container had been left, it seemed more like a controlled chaos. The only thing she had to dig for was a spool of black thread made by Leon, which had gotten thrown behind her bed.

"Tsuna-san," Haru said, as she double-checked the hem. "What were you saying about your father earlier?"

"Hm? Ah, he's just a jerk, not worth worrying about."

"I mean about him trying to hurt you."

"Uh…" Tsuna tried to look around for an out, but any possible conversation starter involved cosplay. "It's nothing, really."

"Sounds a lot like something."

Tsuna grimaced. "Ah...really, it's just a day in the life. But, I guess, during the Representative Battle, I was Reborn's representative and my dad was another Arcobaleno's representative. We made an alliance with them, initially, but then they broke it when they attacked Team Yuni, and I wouldn't back down from helping Team Yuni, so I went off to fight him. My dad, I mean."

Haru had set her hands on her lap, and was listening attentively. She was determined to hear the story no matter how he tried to hem and haw his way around it.

"So...I'd already lost to him once. Knocked me out in one punch. Took me by surprise, honestly, I thought he was…" He shook his head. "So, Round 2, I go after him, we clash, and the smoke clears, and he-he's just _sitting_ there!" His clenched fist was shaking. "He said..he said 'It's not fun fighting with you', and it just broke my will. I don't know why, it's like...like...he told me to take the watch off so he could destroy it. I refused.

"Completely bare-handed, he made a crater in the ground by prying up a massive boulder. I couldn't move. It could have killed me."

Screaming so loud he could barely hear the gunshots.

"I thought it would kill me. He dropped it on me, and...that's when a guy in a suit came in and blasted it to pieces with a pistol. That is what my father did." He rubbed the back of his head. "A day in the life. Anyways, all's well that ends well, right?" He shrugged.

Haru had gone dead pale. She was looking warily at Tsuna.

"Are you okay?"

Haru slowly shook her head. "Tsuna-san...your father tried to drop a cliff on you."

"I, I guess?"

Haru shook her head again. "That's not really a normal thing."

"Well, I mean, it's pretty normal for him, he's always...extreme."

"Just because that's the way it's always been doesn't make it right," Haru said carefully. He looked a little confused. Different tactic, more information then refute the basis of the argument. Shoutout to one month of debate team. "Tsuna-san, do you know _why_ he went so overboard?"

He shifted in his seat. "Well, I think he was trying to teach me a lesson-" He didn't notice Haru's flinch at the way he phrased it. "-but it took, well, it was Reborn who actually got it across right. Respect your opponent, and fight with your Dying Will. I thought I was better than him, cause he left. But he wasn't doing nothing for fourteen years. Since I didn't give it my all when we fought, he beat me twice."

Two cheap shots didn't really strike Haru as being victories, but she didn't say it aloud.

"So that's why. To teach me, I guess."

Haru pursed her lips. She grabbed Tsuna by the wrist and pulled him to his feet. "Come with me."

"Haru! What are you-please stop we'll both fall down the stairs!"

She dragged him down the hall, down the stairs, and into the kitchen, where her father was sitting and grading tests. He looked over the rim of his reading glasses.

"Daaaad!" She pulled Tsuna along and shoved him in front of her.

"Tsunayoshi-kun," Mr. Miura said politely, well used to his daughter's antics.

"Mr. Miura," he said in kind, a little lost.

"Dad," Haru said. "Pretend that Tsuna is your son. He's been slacking off lately and not putting energy into what he does. What do you do?"

"Uh…" He looked from Haru to Tsuna with his jaw slightly slack. He shot a questioning look at Tsuna, and got only a shrug in response. "Right. Well, I suppose I'd say, that is, Tsunayoshi?"

"Yeah?"

"Are you feeling alright? You haven't been applying yourself, and if you worked even a little harder, I think you could do a lot better and be a lot happier. Is there any way I can help you?" He glanced at Haru, and sighed in relief when she gave him a thumbs-up.

"Perfect! So, you wouldn't tell him he's dull to be around and it's not worth the effort of trying?"

Mr. Miura blinked, and slowly removed his glasses. "Haru? Are you feeling okay?"

"And you wouldn't drop a cliff–I mean, you wouldn't try to beat the lesson into him?"

"Haru!" he shouted, horrified.

"Y'see? Tsuna-san's father is horrible at his job of being a father!"

"She's heavily exaggerating," Tsuna said, but Mr. Miura didn't seem to be convinced,

"The next time I see your father I'm giving him a piece of my mind!"

"Haru, really, it's fine, he's never around anyways-"

She had already grabbed him by the wrist and was dragging him out. Mr. Miura had stood and said "Do you need help, Tsunayoshi? In a general sense?"

"No, it's fine, it's just complicated, thank you for your concern, but I've got it handled. Ow, Haru, please let go and I'll follow you."

Mr. Miura considered it for a minute, but he eventually decided to leave it, but to maybe keep an eye on the Sawada Household.

* * *

Haru didn't let Tsuna go after the intervention. As she continued her work, he sat back down on the chair. "Maybe you're right."

"Just think about it," Haru said, as she undid a shoddy stitch.

"Is there anything I can do to help?"

"Hm...can you get my seam ripper out of my sewing kit, over by the closet? A pink plastic handle with a sort of metal hook sticking out of it?"

Tsuna stood, and was immediately lost trying to find her sewing kit among the stacks. Where his mother used a wicker basket with a lid for her sewing supplies, Haru used a plastic bin with compartments, so he looked straight at it and didn't know what it was.

He went to move a black art case out of the way, and realized immediately that it was far too heavy to contain oil pastels or watercolors. "Huh? What's this?"

Haru turned to take a look, and her eyes widened at Tsuna flipping open the latch. "No stop!" She dove for it to keep him from opening the case-Tsuna just barely caught a glance of what looked like a flare gun? But Haru shut it before he could look any closer. "Don't you know better than to go through a girl's things?"

"Sorry, but why do you have a flare gun?"

"What flare gun?"

"The one in that case."

"What case?" And she had it behind her back, still sticking out on either side. "Look, it's a secret, and it's not done yet anyways. You'll be the first to see it when it's finished! Here, I got something better, I'll show you your Christmas gift early!" And she shoved the case under her bed and went to the closet.

 _Probably some cosplay prop. Maybe she's dressing up as the Pyro._ "Wait, Christmas? Seriously?" he said incredulously.

While Christmas wasn't unknown in Japan, it wasn't celebrated very much in Namimori; the most was couples staying in on Christmas Eve. Gift-giving was practically unheard of. _Actually now that I think about it, Christmas is actually a really big deal in Italy since it's the home of Catholicism. I wonder if Gokudera-kun or Bianchi or Lambo is Catholic?_ He knew for a fact that Reborn was not Catholic, or any other form of religion; in his own words, "Every time I walk in a church, I feel like I'm going to spontaneously catch on fire. And the same applies to chapels, temples, and shrines."

"Well, teeechnically," Haru said, stretching out the word, "It was supposed to be your birthday present, but Kyoko-chan made a suggestion for it and I just had to add it. It's still not quite done, but I think you're gonna like it a lot." She finally pulled out a hanger with a cover over the garment.

 _Please don't be a suit please don't be a suit-oh my god it's so much better than a suit,_ he thought when she pulled the cover off.

She held up a sweeping black mantle, longer than she was tall, but on Tsuna it would be just an inch short of the ground. Silver cords draped from the collar, up to simple pins; Tsuna's Burning 'X' emblem laid on the breast.

She saw the way he lit up when he realized what it was, and squealed in glee. "I'm so glad you like it! Come on, try it on."

"Haru, it's amazing, but I shouldn't wear it until it's finished, mm?"

"No, really try it on, I want to check the length."

"Oh. Right."

She helped him slip it over his shoulders, and the mantle settled and he was on the verge of busting out laughing because _this is so cool!_ "This is amazing, Haru."

"You never got to see yourself in all of your awesomeness for Choice, so here's a cape you can wear outside of a fight." She pinned the hem to the appropriate length. "It's made out of Flame-proof fabric, and Kyoko's idea was in these." She pointed at the pins. "Breakaway cape, so if it gets stuck on something or somebody grabs it, it'll just fall away."

"That's clever." And the thought had absolutely occurred to him that given how often his opponents fought dirty, which was always, he'd be a little worried to wear a proper cape. "Like here?"

"I'll show you." She moved around to his back, took the mantle by the edges, and yanked downwards.

She realized then that she probably should have checked that the mechanism worked by testing on her sewing form.

The breakaway clasps didn't break away, the cord dug into Tsuna's throat, and he went toppling back back into Haru gasping, and they both went crashing to the ground in a pile of limbs, black cloth, and pins.

* * *

"That's an interesting bruise," Reborn said, when Tsuna walked in with a line across the front of his neck. Tsuna didn't catch the smirk.

"Haru's fault." He dropped the bag of altered clothes and fell onto his bed. "She tried to choke me with a cape." He sighed. "Thanks for saving my skin, by the way."

"Twice."

"Twice," he agreed. Tsuna held up for a long minute, considering the possible consequences. Finally he sat up. "Hey, Reborn?"

"What?"

"How old are you really?"

"I'm three, of course." He leaned back in his hammock with his hands tucked behind his head. "Going by when I was born, I'm fifty-eight."

"Huh."

It was late already; Tsuna had stuck around the Miura house for a while after Haru tried to choke him out.

His thoughts went back to the day he visited Giotto's Villa; at that time, the Ninth told him that Reborn was still a child when he became boss. He wondered how long, then, that Reborn had been a part of the Vongola. But he didn't ask that.

"Alright," he said. "Then, I mean, how old do you think of yourself as? I mean you don't really act like an old man."

Reborn glanced over and considered Tsuna for a moment. "I was 25 when I was cursed."

 _Figured it was something like that. So…_ He did the math in his head. 2008 minus 58, since it was after October 13. _Born in...1950, cursed between October 1975 and October 1976….assuming he's not messing with me._ He looked over, and Reborn wasn't even looking at him, but absently staring up at the ceiling. _Not messing with me. Geez, now that I think about it, he's spent more of his life with the curse than without it._ "Sorry about all the kid jokes I've made."

"I've gotten used to hearing them from everyone. But, I appreciate the sentiment."

It was late. School the next day. Tsuna shut off the light, and the room was quiet.

Then: "G'night ojiisan."

The sound of the hammer of a gun clicking into place and "I retract my previous statement."

"HIIIIIEEE!"

* * *

 _Later That Night._

The door came open silently. Neither Tsuna nor Reborn were woken by the intruder; they had no reason to think him a threat.

Fuuta had his Ranking Book hugged tight to his chest. His eyes were red and puffy. Still standing in the doorway, he closed his eyes and raised his head. _I can hear you, Ranking Planet._

He'd been practicing. Objects only floated within a foot of him, and they didn't drop violently. _Ranking for sprinting...running...stamina...punching strength...kicking strength...and new category, 'Dying Will'. Overall abilities…479th place._

His stomach was twisting in knots. _Ranking for ambition…_

He didn't know how he left his trance without yelling aloud, but he did. He set his book down against the wall and crept into the room. There was only silence in the night.

 _Most likely place to store ammunition, is the second desk drawer._ He had to move directly beneath Reborn's hammock, and reached into the desk drawer.

At the back was a magazine for a 9mm pistol; he carefully removed a single fire engine red bullet from the magazine and put the rest back, and closed the drawer, and closed the door behind him.

This was dangerous, he knew. It was a massive violation of Omertà. Not only was he stealing, not only was he stealing from the World's Greatest Hitman, but he was stealing the greatest treasure of the Vongola.

If he was found, the Vindice would not give him mercy just because he was a child.

But so long as he could get rid of it quickly, he'd never need to worry about the Vindice or the mafia or ambitious people ever again. They would never be able to find him, and he would never have to trust anybody again.

As he ran out of the house with the Dying Will Bullet in hand, he didn't stop and consider what a lonely life it would be to never trust anybody. He was just thinking about seeing Paris for the first time in nearly five years.

The black night swallowed him up.

* * *

 _Cultural Notes_

 _Ojiisan/jiisan-lit. 'grandpa' in Japanese, it's essentially calling him 'Gramps' or 'Old man'. Jiichan is even more deprecating. Watch those 'I's, because 'ojisan' and other variations are more like 'uncle', it's what Yuni calls Reborn, and she means it more genuinely._

 _'Ka' row sounds-used this phrasing mostly because I only just recently realized what Colonnello was talking about during that fight. When you write out the kana, you organize it according to consonant sound and vowel sound. The 'ka' row includes the sounds 'ka', 'ki', 'ku', 'ke', and 'ko'. You can write out 'Chaos' as 'Ka-o-su', which is still pretty far from how it's actually pronounced, but it's the closest you get. And Reborn's underdeveloped vocal cords couldn't pronounce the combination of the 'ka' sound and that vowel slur 'kay-oss'_

 _Christmas in Japan-much more focused on the 'goodwill' part of it, considering that a small minority of individuals are Christian. The part about it being even less of a big deal in Namimori...I'm gonna be honest, it's solely so that if I get that far, I can have Tsuna and his Guardians in Italy in December, being awkward because none of them are Catholic and everybody else is off being Catholic on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day._

* * *

 _A/N: I'm worried it's a little...anticlimactic. But at the same time, I don't want to drag out the joke forever. If it helps, that plot thread is going to be picked up again at a later time. It's not all sunshine and rainbows *surreptitiously changes the genre from humor to drama*_

 _Next time: Fuuta, again? Target 20: The Dying Will Bullet_


	20. The Dying Will Bullet

**Target 20: The Dying Will Bullet**

It was 9 AM when Tsuna's phone started ringing in the middle of class. All eyes were drawn to him as he fumbled to silence it, "Sorry, I just got it, uh…" He frowned when he saw that the call was from his mother. He glanced at Nezu.

"Sawada," Nezu said, as he pushed his glasses up.

 _Hypothetically speaking…_ Tsuna barely resisted the urge to roll his eyes.

"Hypothetically speaking, if a student tried to leave class to answer a phone call, they wouldn't be expecting to do well on the exam, hm?"

"It's my mom, she knows I'm in class and wouldn't call if it wasn't urgent," Tsuna said. He stood up and walked out the back door as he took the call. He shut the door behind him and said "Hello?"

"Tsu-kun, I'm sorry," she said, and there was a note of worry in her voice as she spoke. "Oh, I got you during class, didn't I?"

"Don't worry about it, mom, what's going on?"

"I might just be paranoid, but, did you see Fuuta this morning before you went to school?"

Tsuna considered it a moment; he had only spoken to his mother for a minute to ask if she knew where the old Go board was, stopped Reborn from stealing his breakfast, and charged out the door. "No, I don't think so, did something happen?"

"He never showed up to school today, I was out registering Lambo-kun and I-pin-chan for next spring and the secretary left a message on my phone reminding me I needed a doctor's note. And when I got back, Fuuta wasn't here." She had become desperate as she continued speaking, trying to hide her fear.

Tsuna felt a shiver down his spine. "I'm sure it's okay, mom, Fuuta's a big kid, but we'll find him, I promise. I'll go talk to Hibari, you stay at home in case he comes back, alright?" He was already headed toward the reception room.

"But your classes…"

"Don't worry, this is more important. I'll call you if we find out anything, or find him, alright?"

"Mm-hm, alright. Alright, Tsu-kun, you go find him."

He ended the call, and made another one instantly. "Reborn, Fuuta has a couple tracking devices on him, right?"

Reborn didn't even bother making a comment about Tsuna charging right into the subject at hand. If Fuuta had been taken, they needed to find him immediately, the poor kid didn't need any more of that trauma. "Both of them were removed. The one in his shoe was cut out with a knife, and both were thrown in the garbage."

Tsuna's first thought was _there was a kidnapper in MY HOUSE?!_ but that made little sense, Fuuta would not only have cried out, but he also shared a room with Lambo and I-pin, and I-pin had all of the senses of a professional assassin and would have perceived an intruder and raised the alarm, and there would then probably be a would-be kidnapper either wriggling from garlic poisoning or flash-fried by electricity. "So if not kidnapped, then maybe he ran away from home?" Tsuna tried to remember if he had ever mentioned the one time he ran away from home to Fuuta, but he wasn't sure; he had hid himself at the park and was not found for several hours. "Was there anything else?"

"There is, and it makes the problem much bigger than a runaway. Go talk to Hibari, I'll be up at the school soon."

Tsuna frowned as he the call ended. _Why does he sound so worried…_

* * *

Hibari had been willing to, quote, help find a lost chick that went missing from the roost, but before he could patrol the city itself, Reborn entered the reception room with "Chaos." Hibari glanced at him, but didn't say anything.

"Oi, Reborn, what's the big problem?" Tsuna said, leaning forward in his seat.

As he spoke, Reborn sat down on the opposite couch. "I'm missing a Dying Will Bullet. Did you take it, Tsuna?"

"Of course not, I learned a long time ago not to go digging through your things."

"I thought not, but I'd hoped it was that simple. Then, the only time somebody could ever steal from me is while I'm asleep, and I would be woken by a hostile presence," Reborn said. "It's likely Fuuta has run away, rather than being kidnapped."

"A kidnapper wouldn't care about taking his shoes."

"And even if they did, the tracking device is nearly undetectable unless you know what you're looking for. So if he ran away, it's likely that he took the missing bullet."

"Wait-why?"

"To sell," Reborn said succinctly. "The Dying Will Bullet is one of the family's greatest treasures, both a symbol of and the source of their power in war. Accordingly, many rivals would pay handsomely to get their hands on even a single one; even when families like the Pesca or the Shimon have reverse-engineered it, it's usually been from bullet fragments. And Fuuta, of all people, would know how much it was worth, in the tens of millions of yen, as opposed to one of his rankings which tend towards the hundreds of thousands."

Tsuna whistled. "Are you sure he would sell it?"

"Most likely. There's a possibility he took it as a keepsake, or to act out, but in that case we would have much more time to find him. We need to assume he intends to sell it, because if he does, then the Vindice will come down on him for violating Omerta."

Tsuna flinched, then cursed. "Damn it-shit, why would he run away? I promise I'd protect him-no, I can't get all crazy now, I have to find him before the Vindice do. How long do you think we have?"

"The only people who know that the bullet is missing are the people in this room," Reborn said, lacing his hands together. "But, the Vindice have ears everywhere."

"Such a sale would make a stir in the underworld," Hibari said, speaking for the first time. "The chick wouldn't stand a chance."

Tsuna tapped his fingers against his leg. He was frowning. "Is there a group in Namimori large enough that would buy a Dying Will Bullet?"

"Not at all," Reborn said, shaking his head. "He'd need to go to at least Yokohama, if not Tokyo to find a buyer. While the Yakuza are disconnected from the Mafia, they know who the Vongola are. And if not the Yakuza, then there's triads with arms in Tokyo, as well."

Tsuna breathed out through his nose. "Chrome said that Ken and Chikusa were beating up Yakuza in Tokyo, last she heard from them. I'll see if they've heard anything. Hnnn, Gokudera was desperate to help when he saw me walk out of class and I sent him to look at the elementary school, I'll send him over to the bus station see if anybody saw him there." He nodded to himself.

Hibari slipped his gakuran over his shoulders and met Tsuna's gaze for a moment. Hibird landed on his head and started singing the Namimori Middle anthem.

 _So much for moving on to high school,_ Tsuna thought, and then: _What happened to all those other Hibirds? I remember him coming into a few dozen that could all say his name._ "Thank you, Hibari-san."

Without another word, Hibari left the room.

Tsuna started scrolling through his contact list. "How can I protect Fuuta from the Vindice? If it comes to that, I mean."

Reborn drew his legs up and sat cross-legged. His feet still couldn't quite reach the floor, but damn if it wasn't getting closer. It was just absurd how much small children grew.

"I can't fight them," Tsuna said.

"Not unless you can use the Ultimate Dying Will on command."

"Not even then. Burns my stamina too quickly." Tsuna called Gokudera while Reborn was thinking.

Gokudera was all too eager to help, and was off to the bus station without question.

"Can't run away," Tsuna said.

"You'd have to stay hidden for the rest of your life, or until they decayed to dust," Reborn said.

Chrome had been out sick that day, but Tsuna caught her awake; she was willing to talk with Ken and Chikusa and see if anything was swirling in the Tokyo-area underworld.

"Don't suppose they'd be willing to give him leniency because I helped them?" Tsuna never took credit for breaking the curse, even if everybody else gave him credit, but desperate times.

"You could try, but it's unlikely." He folded his hands. "The Ninth would be willing to negotiate with the Vindice, but that would also put Fuuta under the Ninth's control."

"I don't like the sound of that."

Reborn adjusted his cuffs. "There's a good way to keep him entirely under your protection, but you're going to pitch a fit. As it lies, the best option would be to take Fuuta as a ward."

Tsuna didn't seem to notice Reborn's somber mood. "A what now? Like...adopting him?"

"In a manner of speaking. It's a way of bringing a child into a Family when they're too young to be Made a man. Originally, back in the Italian Renaissance a Ward would be taken by a noble family as a hostage, or else when their original family is extinct. Now, it's used to bring children who can't be Made a man under the family's protection and control. Lambo was made a ward of the Bovino."

"Alright...how does this help?"

"Because, if Fuuta is named a ward of the Tenth Generation Family, his crime will change from theft to treason, which is considered the right and responsibility of the boss to deliver appropriate punishment, whether that's a slap on the wrist or paying the Vindice to put them in a water cell for a few years."

"Is that why Xanxus was never locked up?"

"Exactly."

"Alright. What's the catch?" Tsuna felt his phone vibrate, but it was only a text from his mother asking if he had had any success finding Fuuta. He replied back quickly to give reassurance. "You're hesitating, which is weird, so it must be a pretty big catch."

"To claim Fuuta as a ward of the Family, you would have to do it as Vongola Decimo. When you're dealing with the Vindice, that isn't something you take back afterwards. If you tell the Vindice that you're going to become Vongola Decimo, you _will_ do it."

Tsuna felt his stomach drop. "Right."

"If you don't believe me," Reborn said, "Call Dino and ask him. Aria, for that matter, she's the one going legitimate."

"It's like 4 AM in Italy," Tsuna said, shaking his head. "And anyways, I believe you, you wouldn't be making that face if you were lying to trick me into becoming the boss."

Reborn's eyebrows vanished into his hairline; geez, when did he lose his perfect poker face at all times? (Probably when he started spending too much time around Tsuna).

"Well, if that's the way it is." Tsuna felt like he was going to be sick. He ran his thumb along the Vongola Ring.

" _No, please, don't hurt them!"_

" _To prosper or perish…"_

" _This is Vongola's Sin."_

He flexed his hand. His phone rang. "Hello?" He listened, and couldn't smile at what he heard, but at least it was information. "Thank you, Gokudera-kun, good work." _Would rather destroy it._ "Clerk helped Fuuta buy a bus ticket to the Keio Terminal at 5 AM." He tapped his foot against the floor, and stood up. "Okay, who the hell looks at a ten year old buying a bus ticket at 5 AM with cash and just barely acknowledges it! Like that's just a little weird, right?" He only just kept himself from throwing his phone in frustration. "Stupid-stupid. It's all just stupid."

He started digging through his backpack, came up with his gloves and his pills, but his contacts and headphones were at home. "I need to stop at home, then I'm flying to Tokyo. We have some comm links at home that work with my headphones, can you guide me through negotiating with the Vindice? I don't think I trust myself to not screw it up."

"Given the idiotic ritual-esque way they conduct negotiation, I don't trust you to, either."

* * *

Tsu-kun walked in the door and lied to her face. At least with him, she knew he had the best intentions when he said something and didn't meet her eyes. But this wasn't the time to challenge him, it was little more than a passing thought before she was back to pacing in worry.

"Somebody saw him up by the bus station." _Lie._ "Gokudera-kun talked to the clerk, he bought a ticket for Keio in Tokyo early this morning. I'm leaving right now to go find him, he might well just be sitting on a bench in the bus station, and if not he can't have gone unnoticed." He pulled his jacket on. "I'll bring him home, mom, I promise." _Truth._ "It'll all be okay, it'll be okay." _Lie._

She threw her arms around him and hugged him tightly. He didn't try to wriggle away like he would have when he was younger, but then, when he was younger he wouldn't have been so motivated, either. She kissed his cheek, said "Keep safe," and he bolted out the door.

* * *

Halfway to Tokyo, Tsuna got a call from Chrome.

" _Ken said that there was talk about an arms deal, and that a Yakuza group is involved. They're waiting for you in Shibuya, near the statue of Hachiko."_

Tsuna wanted to curse aloud. "Thank you, Chrome."

 _This is a war to regain the pride…_

* * *

Ken kicked the ground. He had one of his cartridges held between his fingers. "Damn it, where that Vongola, byon? I'll kick his ass when he finally shows up."

"Calm down, Ken," Chikusa said. He was sitting on a bench, carefully refilling his yoyo with paralytic poison. It was somewhat slower than his old formula, but it also wasn't lethal except in far larger quantities. He adjusted his glasses, and absently smiled. His old ones had been cracked in the lens and taped in the middle, but Chrome had made him pick out a new pair some months earlier when she learned they had been damaged during the fight with the Vindice.

"Why are we even here, byon? Just some stupid kid," he muttered.

"That's why we're here, Ken," Chikusa said. "Because it's a kid. Because he's _that_ kid."

Ken wriggled uncomfortably at the reminder of just who this kid was. "The Vongola'd better hurry up. That kid's more likely to go running when he sees either of us, byon." He sniffed the air and spat at the smell he picked up. "Smoke and desperation, that'll be him. Peacock freaks won't know what hit 'em."

* * *

The Ookajuku-Kai was a rising gang with a relatively short history. It was ranked the number three strongest yakuza association in Tokyo, but the number one wealthiest. The current Oyabun was a gangster who was ranked one hundredth 'Most Trustworthy in a Business Deal' out of 893 Bosses, Yatsumoto Kaoru.

This was not who Fuuta was selling to.

He was selling to the Oyabun's son and heir, Yatsumoto Shinji, who was ranked 12th for 'Biggest Egos in the Criminal Underworld'.

When Fuuta came to the overpass, he couldn't hide his fear at realizing he was surrounded by two dozen yakuza. Many had tattoos across their arms and up their necks; a few were lacking segments of their little finger from the practice of yubitsume, ritual mutilation done by yakuza. Most had some kind of blunt weapon, but a few had uncomfortably real-looking katana, and one even had a gun.

A reedy Japanese young man with a tattoo on his tongue approached out of the shadows, grinning with his tongue sticking out. Next to him was an older man with all the look of a lawyer carrying a briefcase.

"Now how did a little midget like you get the fucking Vongola's treasure, eh?" said Yatsumoto, raising an eyebrow. "Bet there's an interesting story there."

Fuuta steeled himself, like he had to do when selling rankings. "I'm not here to sell a story."

"Course, course." Yatsumoto waved nonchalantly. He had an odachi hanging from a scabbard across his shoulders. "As requested, U.S. One-point-two million. You just hand over that funny bullet, and you get your payment."

"I don't have it on me," Fuuta said stiffly. He tugged at a loose thread hanging from his scarf. "Give me the payment, and I'll tell you where it is." The thread came out four inches long and snapped off.

Yatsumoto had a look of disdain. "You don't trust me?"

"I don't trust anyone."

"Smart kid."

One of Yatsumoto's men approached him and whispered something to him. Fuuta wound the string so tight around his finger that it cut off blood flow and the tip turned white.

"Huh," said Yatsumoto, and a wicked smile spread across his features. He took a step toward Fuuta, and Fuuta took a step back right into a gangster who wrapped a hand around his shoulder.

"Hold on, let go!"

"It's interesting," Yatsumoto said. "According to my man, you look an awful lot like that 'Ranking Prince' the Sicilians have been hogging. Eh? How about, we get the Dying Will Bullet, _and_ the best information broker in the underworld?"

Fuuta couldn't even scream. The gangster had a heavy grip at the base of his neck, could have snapped his spine with a thought. He cried out.

Suddenly, the hand was gone, the gangster screaming as he flew across the road, and all hell broke loose.

Ken and Chikusa went along the perimeter and took down gangsters one at a time. Ken put his Lion cartridge in and his teeth were limned in Sun flames to tear right through the stab vests most of them wore, putting them down on the ground. Chikusa ran too quickly to follow, using the wire on one yoyo to yank weapons away, and precisely throwing poisoned needles with the other, both reinforced with Rain flames along their lengths.

The big enforcer that had grabbed Fuuta stood back up and looked around for his attacker. Tsuna happily obliged, stepping up between the enforcer and Fuuta, silent and wreathed in flame. The enforcer flinched, but he had his gun in hand. Before he could even think to take a shot, Tsuna was upon him, put his fingertips on his forehead, and lit a Flame of Day his hand. The enforcer jerked to a stop and dropped, crawling away even as Tsuna turned to Yatsumoto and his aide.

Fuuta was paralyzed from fear, even as he realized that Tsuna had found him and was going to force him to come back. He wanted to move, but his feet wouldn't listen.

Yatsumoto's teeth were chattering as Tsuna came toward him while Ken and Chikusa approached from behind. Tsuna raised his gloved hand alight in amber, but he didn't get that far.

Yatsumoto couldn't even speak correctly. "Vong-g-gola…" His aide was sweating, even moreso when his boss shoved him forward and took off without him.

"Get out of here," Tsuna said to the aide, and he was gone.

For a moment, it was silent.

"No," Fuuta said quietly. "I don't want-why are you _here?_ " he cried desperately, his hands tightly curled and his whole body shaking.

Tsuna suspended Hyper Mode and returned to Fuuta, but the boy only slapped his hand away. "Fuuta, I came to bring you home. Please, tell me what's wrong and we can fix it."

"Get away from me, I don't want to be near you! I just wanted to be alone, never have to be near anyone, just, just-"

"Vongola," Chikusa said in warning as he and Ken moved away. Tsuna could feel the change in the air.

" _No, please, not my son! Get away from him you bastards!"_

"Stay behind me," Tsuna said, putting a hand lightly on Fuuta's shoulder.

"No, let go of-"

"Fuuta!" Tsuna said sternly, more than he meant to, but he couldn't let Fuuta be harmed, be so much as _touched_ by _them._ Fuuta cowered and wouldn't meet his eyes, but he didn't try to run away.

A train rolled by overhead. From the depths of the shadows beneath the overpass came a figure limned with the Flame of Night. The solitary Vindice wore their uniform, and had bandages covering their face, but Tsuna recognized the way they spun the end of their chains.

" _Or should I say, Bermuda von Veckenstein?"_

"Jack," Tsuna said. "I hope there's no hard feelings." There was only silence in his headphones.

The Vindice was fixed on Fuuta. Fuuta was frozen in terror. The chains Jack carried rattled, but he didn't move or try to force Tsuna to move. " **Sawada Tsunayoshi."** The sound of his voice put a shiver down Tsuna's spine, but he hid it behind a stiff upper lip. " **You will relinquish the boy to the Vindice."**

Tsuna nearly sighed in relief when Reborn spoke up in his headphones. "Repeat after me. On what grounds?"

"On what grounds?"

" **The boy has committed theft of the property of the Vongola Family, with the intention to sell its secrets to outsiders. For this, it is our right and responsibility to mete out justice, according to the contract settled with Vongola Secondo."** Jack was emotionless, a stark contrast to his passion when he and Tsuna had fought. But for a walking corpse, there couldn't be much that brought about passion.

Tsuna paused to listen, then carefully said "Can you not show mercy for this child, who didn't know the ramifications of his actions?"

" **Ignorance is not a defense; we show no mercy."**

And didn't he know it well.

"Can you not show mercy in recognition of the work I have done that directly aided the Vindice? The defeat of Daemon Spade's phantom, and the breaking of the Rainbow Curse?" It felt weird to speak so formally, like he was reading off of a notecard. For that matter, Reborn sounded uncomfortable saying it. Tsuna recalled what he had said about the Ninth negotiating on his behalf before, and wondered if he was borrowing from how the Ninth had spoken to the Vindice.

" **It is in recognition of those actions that I give you the chance to step aside, Sawada Tsunayoshi."**

Neither Tsuna nor Reborn had expected him to grant either request for mercy, but it was like a ritual or a game, negotiating with Vindice. They demanded respect, and kind of deserved it with their power, but the way they negotiated was practically MedievaI, being just as concerned with maintaining status. Their erratic behavior during the Representative War was the exception to the rule. At least they were willing to negotiate, rather than just shutting him down.

Which brought it to the point of the negotiation. Tsuna could feel the pulse of his own heartbeat. His thumb ran over the Vongola Ring. " _I'll destroy the Vongola!"_ He wetted his lips. Fuuta was clinging to his leg. Live without regrets. "Then I petition to officially claim Fuuta de la Stella as a ward of the Tenth Generation Vongola Family."

Jack was equally surprised and amused by this development, enough that he cut the fluff and got to the point. " **By what right?"**

" _To prosper or ruin…"_

"By my right as Vongola Decimo."

Jack paused for a long moment. Perhaps he, too, was being guided in what to say.

" **We accept your claim,"** he said, finally. " **The boy's punishment is your right and responsibility."**

"Thank you," he said to be polite, when all he wanted to do was scream.

" **The Vindice will be watching, Vongola Decimo. Farewell."**

The Vindice glided into a pool made of the Flame of Night, and vanished, and Tsuna felt a huge weight lift off his chest, only for another to settle in when he realized the turn his life had taken.

He held his microphone as he spoke into it. "He's go-" Voice crack. "Gone. Thanks, Reborn."

"No problem, boss."

"Oh bite me jiisan."

Fuuta came back to life all at once, and backed away from Tsuna, shaking. "No, no no no, no! Why did you _do_ that? I don't want to be part of your family! I don't want to stay here!" His face was blotchy and streaked. "What's my _punishment_ gonna be, huh? To make rankings for the rest of my life?"

Tsuna didn't try to grab him, but he did kneel down and reach out toward him. He felt a pang of pity for the boy who had been treated like an object all his life. "Fuuta, I swear to you I never would, I just wanted to protect you from the Vindice and it was the only way I could. Please, just tell me what's wrong."

"Tsuna-nii," he said without meaning to, and stomped his foot on the ground. "You-you-you changed, but you're just like everyone else now! I ranked you, yesterday, for the first time in a year, and I saw it but I didn't want to believe it so I tried again-" There were tears in his eyes. "But it's true! You used to be ranked last for combat ability, and last for ambition, but now?! You're ranked _twentieth_ most ambitious! _Twentieth!_ So you'll take my book and make me rank to get to your goals and throw me out when I'm useless!"

Tsuna brushed aside his surprise at his placement for ambition, and said "Fuuta, you're my little brother, I swear I wouldn't ever so much as ask you to rank sweet things, and I'd rather die than hurt you!"

"Stop _lying!"_ Fuuta shouted, clapping his hands over his ears. Tears rolled down his face. "Stop lying to me, I know you're just horrible, my rankings are never wrong, never never never!""

"Fuuta, please-"

"Oh screw _this!"_ Ken shouted as he charged forward and smacked Fuuta over the top of the head with an open hand. Tsuna was too stunned to react, and Chikusa only sighed.

Ken knelt down, grabbed Fuuta by the front of his shirt, and said "Pay attention, byon! What the fuck is wrong with ambition? All it means is wanting to make life better for you and yours, ain't that right Vongola? And he's even got his head on right, byon, he's not gonna fuck off and leave you behind, I'd kill to have a person like that around when I was ten! The damn Vongola just stared down a Vindice for your sake and you're gonna just-"

Chikusa put a hand on Ken's arm, and he reluctantly loosened his hold. Chikusa knelt down then, and quietly said "They won't let him forget that he called himself the Tenth, kid."

Fuuta looked up, sniffled, and wiped his eyes. He looked at Tsuna and back at Chikusa.

In a tone too quiet for Tsuna to hear, Chikusa whispered something to Fuuta. Ken joined in with "Yeah, and I'll tear his throat out!" so it was probably along the lines of "If he tries to hurt you, give us a call."

Fuuta slowly nodded, and walked back to Tsuna with his eyes to the ground. He raised his closed fist to chest level, and said "I miss mamá." He opened his hand to show Tsuna the gleaming red Dying Will Bullet.

He picked it up and held it between his thumb and forefinger. It was warm to the touch. "She missed you, too, was really worried about you." Fuuta still wouldn't look at him. "Hey, my pockets are a little full, could you hold onto this a little longer?"

Fuuta finally looked up at him. He was crying silently, but he took it back and held it as tightly as before. "Tsuna-nii," he said, as Tsuna drew himself up to his full height. "What about, my, my punishment?"

Tsuna sighed heavily. Fuuta was so young, but he was so used to not being able to trust people already. The world that they- _they_ -lived in. _It's not right. It's just so wrong, that he's been through so much._ "Punishment. Well, hn. No dessert tonight-" Fuuta didn't seem to notice that it was a Wednesday and they never had dessert on Wednesdays. "And then…"

* * *

Tsuna put a hand on Fuuta's shoulder. "It's gonna be okay, I promise."

"He'll be angry at me."

"He was just as worried as everyone else. I'm right here with you."

Fuuta took a deep breath and opened the door. Reborn was sitting in the room reading a paper, just where Tsuna had asked him to wait.

Tsuna nudged him forward, and Fuuta approached with his hands down at his sides.

"Mr. Reborn, I, um," he said, fidgeting in place. "I took a Dying Will Bullet from you. I stole it, I mean. It was wrong, and I'm sorry." He held it up at eye level.

Reborn plucked the bullet from his hand, examined it, and said "All's well that ends well. You're forgiven."

Fuuta let out the breath he'd been holding. Tsuna nodded. "Alright, I think mom still wants to hug you some more. I'll be down in a minute."

"Mm-hm!" Fuuta nodded, and went running out of the room. Nana had just about lost her mind when she got the call saying that he had found Fuuta and was coming home on the next bus, and she still hadn't gotten her relief out completely. It was fortunate, because it meant that she didn't pay too close attention to Tsuna's mood.

Tsuna fell back on his bed, with his arm over his eyes. "Why are _you_ so grim?"

Again, Reborn cursed that he had spent way too much time around overly-emotional people. He collected himself and said "Believe it or not, threatening somebody isn't an effective way to have them make a decision with obvious consequences in the long term."

"You looking down on threats?"

"I said long term decisions, short term compliance is fine," he said nonchalantly.

"Yeah, yeah. So, what, I had to make the decision for myself, and not because I was forced to?"

"Essentially."

"Right...I guess I would have been...pretty weird if you had just come in and threatened my mom to make me comply."

"You would have been completely unpredictable and self-destructive," Reborn said with certainty.

Tsuna breathed heavily. "Got a lot of work to do if I don't want any other kids to end up like Fuuta."

Reborn wasn't surprised to hear that, but he still smiled. "You've got time to prepare, you'll be finishing high school at least in Namimori. If the Ninth is still in good health by then, I may petition for you to attend school in Tokyo, much better business schools than in Palermo."

Tsuna sprang up from his seat. "Wait, really?"

"Of course, did you think you were going to get shipped off to Italy immediately?"

"Uh...yeah."

"You're still _Dame_ -Tsuna, and I wouldn't be able to teach you if you were surrounded by gangsters at all times."

"So you're sticking around, then? Not going to leave? Because I think I'd start a gang war in the first week if you weren't around."

"Oh, you have no idea just what I have in store for you, my...student."

"You were going to say victim, weren't you?"

"Who knows?"

Tsuna grumbled something incomprehensible about a sadistic old man, stood up from his bed, and while he said it, it was more like thinking aloud. "Alright. Need to talk to everyone. Before the Ninth, before my dad, need to talk to my friends. Ugh, my dad. I'm gonna put that call off as long as possible."

As Tsuna walked out of the room making phone calls to his Guardians, Reborn rubbed Leon on the underside of his head.

To think, there was a time when he thought he wouldn't live to see Tsuna become the Tenth. Now, to make him a good one.

* * *

 _Cultural Notes_

 _Hachiko-the statue of the faithful dog in Shibuya. Look it up if you want to know more, but the statue is a popular meet-up spot._

 _Tattoos-yakuza, both in real life and in fiction, are notes for having sprawling tattoos across their bodies done in a traditional style that is also very expensive. Usually hidden when out in public, although having one on your tongue would make that a little difficult. Note: the author knows nothing about tattoos, especially whether or not they can be placed on the tongue. It just gives that extra hint of absolute sleazeball._

 _Yubitsume-ritual mutilation involving cutting off part of the little finger and ceremoniously presenting it to your superior as punishment for misbehavior or failure. The idea is that in the Japanese style of swordsmanship, the last three fingers hold most of the weight of the sword, so if you lose the last bit of your pinky it handicaps you, and makes you more dependent on the organization for protection._

 _Ookajuku-Great Peacock, literally._

* * *

 _A/N:_

 _I don't think a single person is going to believe me when I claim that when I was first plotting this out, that was not how I saw it being resolved. Tsuna was going to become the Tenth eventually, yeah, but not here and now. But then I started thinking about it, and I realized that the conclusion I originally had planned, would have destroyed any credibility that the Vindice had, and turned them into something of a joke. And that turned into Tsuna choosing to become the Tenth to protect Fuuta._

 _Until next time, my friends. Cheers._


	21. Blur

**Target 21: Blur**

Tsuna made it all the way to the front gate of the school before he realized it was Saturday and there were no classes.

He kicked the ground, and kicked it again. He stomped his foot into the ground, kicked at the bottom of the wall, smacked at it with an open palm, kicked it again and again and screamed out. He punched the brick and his knuckles tore but at least he could feel _something_ after three days passing in a blur barely registering, wake up go to school go home go to bed. He punched and screamed and cursed, and when he had lines down his hands and his voice was hoarse, he walked away, anywhere but back home.

* * *

When Hana opened the door to find Tsuna standing there looking a little dead in the eyes, all she could do was drag him inside and throw a first aid kit at him. "Forgive me for not playing nurse," she said sarcastically.

"Thanks Kurokawa." He used an alcohol wipe on his hands.

"What do you want, Sawada?"

"Um..." He shifted uncomfortably in his seat. Hana's room wasn't what he had expected. In one tiny corner was schoolbooks; the bookshelf was much like the bins under his bed, in that it was packed full of back issues of Jump and thirty volumes of One Piece, and several other collected seinen manga. Her bed was neatly made, and the desk was a mess of papers.

"I'd heard you were...something like, an information broker?" Tsuna said uncertainly.

Hana rolled her eyes. "I figured. What exactly do you want?"

Reassurance that he wasn't going to crash and burn and bring everyone else down with him. But Hana couldn't provide that.

He stood up. "I'm sorry, I'm just wasting your time."

"Sit back down, Sawada, you're not leaving in this state." And she put her hands on his shoulders and forcibly pushed him back down in his seat. "Now then, let's make two things perfectly clear. One: I am not an information broker. I will not sell secrets to the highest bidder. I'm just very good at finding the information I want. Half the time, it's reading between the lines on the Associated Press and CNN Italia. That information is to help me, and the people I care about."

"Okay, okay. What's the second thing to know?"

"That in the past three days, six people have come to my house looking for information; and you aren't even the only one that was injured." She put her hand on her hip. "You're far from the only one freaking out, but guess what? Everyone else can tell that you're freaking out, so they freak out, and spend so much time worrying they can't actually think."

"I..."

"Gokudera came in asking about the Ookajuku-Kai. Kyouko about the underworld in general. Dokuro about ESP. Yamamoto about the Vongola. Haru about Flames. And, that weird kid came by, too."

"Weird kid?"

She pursed her lips. "Eugh. Reborn," she said, as though it were painful to even say the name of a child. "Said if I say anything outside of the...the 'Tenth Generation', he'd shoot me. Apparently this is the turn my life has taken."

"Sorry. If you want out I could try-"

"Sawada, the very fact that I'm still talking to you is evidence that I'm not ducking out," she said flatly. "I could turn a blind eye, let it go, but I won't, because I'm a nice person." She had a resigned smile on her face, so Tsuna felt safe laughing lightly.

Hana turned and booted up her computer. "Exactly. I'm here for me, and Kyouko, and Miura. The only way I know how to protect people is with information, so I'll do the best I can with that." She put her reading glasses on and said "Who's in the Tenth Generation?"

Tsuna nearly got whiplash from that. "Uh..."

"Who can I talk to about weird mafia magic and not get shot?" she said impatiently.

"I won't let Reborn shoot you." He rubbed his eyes. "Geez, just about anybody I talk to on a normal basis. Gokudera, Yamamoto-"

"Outside of your bodyguards."

"Guardians. They're the Guardians of the Vongola Gear."

"Whatever. Outside of your Guardians." She waved her hand as though to emphasize the essential capital 'G'.

"Alright, so, associates is the word I guess? People that know what's going on, and who I trust. Um...Kyouko, Haru, Bianchi, Fuuta, I-pin."

"The little girl?"

"Is also third most promising young assassin, and came to the Future with us."

"Alright." She wasn't making a physical list, but a mental one. "What about your mother?"

"No, she doesn't know anything. My dad's kept it a secret for the last seventeen years."

Hana shot him a look of disbelief, and shook her head. "Or she's deliberately ignorant. But that's none of my business." She took a sip from her thermos. "Anyone else?"

"Irie Shouichi, he's a high schooler, Joushima Ken and Kakimoto Chikusa, they're friends of Chrome's. Uh..."

"What about Kozato and that whole group?"

Tsuna frowned. "That...it's complicated right now."

"Right," she said, dragging out the word when Tsuna made no indication of intending to elaborate. "And Reborn?"

"What? Of course."

She put her hands up defensively. "Hey, he works for the last boss, right? I was just making sure." She rubbed her eyes. "Y'know, he has like no history? If he really wasn't always a kid, then he must have had somebody erase who he used to be. Only explanation."

Tsuna thought about how Reborn's title was 'World's Greatest Hitman', and just how good he really was, and what he had said about how he had fought for his Family many more times than Iemitsu. He wondered again just how many people Reborn had killed on the Ninth's order. "Whatever happened in the past, only way I can protect everyone is if I can work with some people with their share of darkness. Doesn't mean I'll overlook stuff they do now, but..."

"Like everyone gets a shot at redemption?" She was smiling lightly. "I can understand that."

Tsuna stood up again, and she told him to sit down again. "We're not done here. If you don't have anything specific, we're gonna sit here and pick apart the Vongola's empire. Cover companies, associates, the works."

"That's...actually a good idea."

"I'm glad you agree. Now like I said, I'm not an information broker, so we trade. I lay out the mess of a conglomerate that is Vocentro, the main public face, and you tell me what, exactly, a Sky Flame is." She stuck a finger in his face. "And I mean besides 'orange'! That's all that Kyouko could tell me, and it's been irritating."

"O-okay. Well, yeah, they're orange, look most like, well, a normal flame. They have the highest energy density, and the best efficiency of stamina invested to power produced."

Hana was typing away at her computer the moment she realized he was being legit with his information.

"The property of Sky Flames is 'Harmonization', which sounds really abstract but it can be applied in two ways, really. First and more useful really, is to 'Change the form of energy to something more stable'. It can neutralize other Flames and make them harmless, turn box animals to stone, and convert another person's Flame into the same type, so it can then be absorbed. The second use is to 'Spread Flames evenly', like my Flames are really stable and project evenly, which is why I can fly without needing another piece of equipment to regulate Flame output, like the Storm Disk or Yamamoto's tanto. I can use the same property to stun someone with my Sun flame using very little energy, spreading it evenly through their body."

Hana paused. "What do you know about the other types of Flames? Like, Rain?"

"Um...they're blue, and look like water." He thought of how Yamamoto worked his Flames with Shigure Soen Ryu. "Lower temperatures but very stable. Low energy, really, the short swords make it so the massive Flame Yamamoto uses is focused into a tighter cone. Their property is Tranquility, it can reduce the effectiveness of other Flames by sapping the energy, and slow down or even stop cell activity. So it's good for countering other boxes, or directly disabling somebody. And the stable projection makes it useful for producing shields. Uh..."

Hana had turned around again, pulled her glasses off, and stared at Tsuna. "I asked Yamamoto what Rain Flames did, because I have one. His response was to make the sound of rain with his mouth, and make a gesture like he was playing the piano in the air like" and she wiggled her fingers with her hand up. "Like I guess the way rain falls pattering? And I tried to ask Gokudera, he said 'Tranquility' and resumed his interrogation. So, since you appear to understand Flames better than the others do, I get explanations and you get all the information about mafia that I can dig up."

Tsuna probably would have given explanations even without giving anything in return, but he wasn't about to say no, either. "So, can you give me an overview of the Vongola's business side?"

"I can even do it with a middle school level vocabulary."

* * *

"So what are you thinking?"

"I'm thinking...a few things. Mostly in the vein of 'I'm in way over my head.'"

"Aren't we all?"

The barista set down the coffee for Tsuna and tea for Hana. At his insistence, he paid for both.

"How did you know you're a Rain?" he said, once they sat down. It was busy in the cafe, which hid their conversation, but not so busy that Tsuna could miss any eavesdroppers. _Man I'm getting paranoid._

Hana pulled out the ring on a chain around her neck. "My great-some-grandmother's. Lit it up with a blue Flame."

"Wait...wait. Did you…get help doing it?"

"Eh? No, first person who knew what I was doing was Kyouko."

Tsuna took a long sip of his coffee. He was just starting to get a taste for it. "Well nobody else I know could do it without help."

Hana's eyebrows went up, and then she smiled smugly. "Better than all you monkeys, hm?"

"Or you're lucky," he said, a little deflated. "How did you even know that ring would work? Was your great-some-grandmother yakuza?"

"E'la nostra ora incisa sull'anello. You talk in your sleep."

Tsuna felt like somebody had punched him in the stomach. "Oh?" he said hollowly.

"Uh-huh. So, I was thinking…" She went into her whole theory about why rings work and Tsuna tried not to break his mug.

"...So I decided to try the oldest ring in the house, and it worked. Sawada, are you even listening?"

"Hana, can I ask you a favor?"

"If you stop saying my name like that."

"If you ever hear me say that in my sleep again, please, wake me up."

"Hm?" She tilted her head, and only then realized how tense Tsuna had gone. _A nightmare?_ "Sure, sure, whatever. So, next thing I wanted to ask about, what's this about Sun Activation?"

Tsuna blinked. "Uhm...increasing cell activity. Can be used to speed up cell division to heal injuries, increase activity in nerves and muscles to increase combat ability, over-stimulate nerves to stun…"

"Sawada, a hint from me to you: everybody is weird, everybody has their hang-ups, everybody has their demons. Get it? Don't act so weird. Besides, I only heard you muttering in your sleep 'cause we sit right next to each other, alright?"

Tsuna bit his lip. "I think I get what you mean. I...I'll say it again, Hana, if you want out…"

Hana nearly throttled him. _Damn it does he just want me gone? Does he hate me that much? Idiot monkey boy, I swear to god!_ "I got it. What's 'Construction', exactly?"

* * *

The door was slammed so hard in Ezekiel's face that he got hit in the face and got a nosebleed. He cursed as he tried to stifle it.

" _I believe we can find unity in our purpose, Mr. Bunraku," he said graciously._

" _I don't work with Sicilians," he said stiffly. Tattoos wrapped around his chest and arms. "Tell your boss, whomever he is, that the Momokyoukai are their own."_

" _But we share a goal, my friend," Ezekiel insisted. "Both of us seek justice against the damn Vongola."_

 _Bunraku's eyes narrowed, and the room went cold. "It is because of Vongola that I no longer deal with Sicilians, after three mere boys destroyed half of my organization. Their leader even used the Vongola's Flame."_

" _Sawada Tsunayoshi. That is the boy."_

" _Oh? Well, Sawada Tsunayoshi-kun can do what he likes, as long as it doesn't disturb my Family. I have my people to worry about. The Bronco paid for treatment; I can't be looking for revenge. Now, get out of my office."_

Ezekiel wiped his face with his sleeve, and sighed. "Always the hard way." He flicked a coin over his fingers. On one side of the silver coin was the emblem of the long-defunct Angelo Family; on the other, a raised image of a set of scales in balance.

He reached inside his jacket and pulled out an indigo box with the emblem of a yakuza group on the side. They hadn't been in much of a position to argue his taking the box. And he was only stealing from thieves; the damn creators of these boxes were taking hits to their bottom line in order to keep them away from criminals. It was only so successful.

He lit the ring that had been his father's, and opened the box. From it came a dozen butterflies coated in Mist Flames with wings the color of dust. The Hell Butterflies were the original inspiration for the Box Weapons, being creatures from the deep Amazon Rainforest capable of using low-level illusions to hide from predators. It was only natural, then, that the first mass produced Mist Box was modeled after it.

They settled on his skin, and he pushed the door open, strode inside, and nobody looked at him. He wasn't invisible, but simply wasn't interesting enough to pay attention to.

An hour later, most of the Momokyoukai's leadership had marks on their collarbones, driving them to seek Justice in a manner far outweighing the crime.

"He cares about civilians. Willing to let himself be hurt for the sake of the so-called innocent. He won't go easy on yakuza, though."

"Next Saturday. Busy in town. He'll get his, that Vongola. And we'll get ours, our Justice."

"I'm glad to hear that, Mr. Bunraku."

* * *

Angelo Quarto and his heir died on December 21, 1965, leaving twin siblings. The girl, although more of a woman, went on to become Adamo the First, and had two sons. The younger succeeded her after committing fratricide; he had a son, Dante, who was Adamo's Third.

The other child of Angelo Quarto was a man named Durante, who founded the Eva and had a direct lineage from himself, to his son, to his granddaughter, called Maria.

This made Dante and Maria second cousins, who had met three times ever, although Dante only remembered their third meeting, the only one in their adult lives. This was the second meeting in their adult lives, and the fourth time ever.

Dante sat in a fine black suit and crimson shirt, his blonde hair swept back, gently spinning his ring around his finger with his thumb.

"I heard about your wife," Maria said finally. "We met last time I visited Palermo. She seemed a lovely woman. I'm sorry." Maria was darker in her coloring than Dante, although it wasn't too difficult to do compared to his pasty skin tone. In a whimsical (drunken) mood, she had called herself 'umber', and it stuck as an epithet among her Family: the Umber Lady. She didn't mind it too much.

The private lounge was quiet. The club in the city of Milan was well-used to hosting gangsters. Dante was accompanied by Barbarossa; Maria, by a brute of a man with a scar across his neck and a confident look in his eyes. Strapped across his back was a folding Lucerne hammer, shaped to resemble a gavel, made of black steel.

"I'm sorry, too." He leaned forward and uncorked the bottle set on the table. He gently poured out wine into two glasses, and said "Please, have a drink."

Maria resisted the urge to curse at him for wasting her time. She picked up the glass of white wine and sniffed it.

"Gian, a drink?" he offered. Barbarossa declined politely. "Yes, ah, forgive me, I didn't catch your name." He looked to the large man, just as politely as if he weren't in cargo pants and a muscle shirt.

He very deliberately raised his hands, and made gestures at chest level. He smiled, even when it was apparent that Dante wasn't following.

"Sorry, I don't know sign language very well."

"His name is Luca," Maria said, and made to signs with her right hand to indicate his sign name. "He is a dear friend of mine."

"Luca, then, would you care for a drink?"

Luca shook his head and signed "No."

Dante set the bottle back down. "A bit paranoid, coz?"

"Properly paranoid, I would say," she said, and removed the drug test stick from her glass. "What is this about, Dante?"

He considered his options, and decided that it would be best to be direct with Maria. "I want to talk about an alliance between our Families."

"You're a fucking idiot."

"Just a basic defensive alliance, only aiding if attacked."

"What the hell are you up to?"

"Securing my Family's future is all."

"Well your Family won't have a future if we cut an alliance, or did you forget the bullet in my father's head for daring to step out of line?"

"And who gave that kill order? Do you know?" He leaned forward in his seat. "Who invited him to lunch, and ordered him shot? Vongola Nono gave the order, that crow of his took the shot."

"This isn't about securing your Family, is it? You're just looking to provoke the Vongola for some fifty-year-old slight."

"I'm not going to provoke the Vongola, I'm going to stand my ground. If you want to avenge your father's death-"

"And what makes you think he was the kind of man worth avenging? Dante, last I remember, you were going to go legitimate. What changed?"

"My wife died of a wasting illness, and the Vongola chose a successor."

"I thought it was still up in the air after the disastrous Inheritance Ceremony?"

Few outside the Family and its closest allies knew exactly what happened at the Inheritance Ceremony, and Dante and Maria were no exception. But they did know that an attacking Family had killed three Giegue men and crippled one of the Ninth Gen officers.

"It was. Now it's official. According to my uncle, a teenage boy. His right hand is the Smokin' Bomb. One of his officers defeated Squalo of the Varia. His 'Mist Guardian' as they call it, Mukuro Rokudou."

"Six Paths? Gods be good, I thought he was dead."

He sipped his champagne. "I don't want to see another 40 year reign, Maria. This boy...at least Xanxus was predictable. This boy could be even worse!"

* * *

"So," Tsuna said, as he got clothes out for the next morning. "I was thinking about codenames."

"If they're puns, I'll shoot you."

"No! Well! One is…um, so, Yamamoto is Nigiri, Lambo is Nori, Gokudera is Crudo, Chrome is Sashimi, and I haven't thought of one for Ryohei yet."

Reborn blinked, considered it a moment, and shook his head. "It's all sushi. I'll never understand food fixations…"

"Hey, it didn't you take twenty years this time!"

Tsuna was smiling. Reborn steadily went from off-balance to silently steaming.

"You thought his last name was Nougat."

Reborn's mouth was drawn into a thin line as he tried to figure out how best to respond and keep his composure, even as Tsuna was trying to cover his mouth with both hands.

"I'm going to murder Visconti." But he was loading an SMG with paintballs, and it didn't take a genius to know just who his target was.

* * *

As Tsuna washed paint out of his hair in his second shower of the night, he felt a little less numb. There was time. There wasn't all the time in the world, but there was time to take control of his fate. And for the moment, at least, nothing had changed. It was comforting knowledge.

* * *

The door of the lounge came open, and the owner was pushed through by a man in a suit, followed by a tall man and a short woman.

"In all my years!" the owner shouted, and got smacked to the floor.

"Maria di Eva," said Sawada Iemitsu, as he entered. "I heard you had stepped out of your palace, and I just happened to be in the neighborhood. It's really been too long since we've last spoken."

For the first time, Luca spoke, and his voice was like a corpse speaking, like his vocal cords had started to petrify. " _I'mitsuu Swuda_ ," he said. Dante had the composure to not react, but Barbarossa flinched, Iemitsu shifted in his seat, and Tumeric and Oregano shared a look.

"You remember Luca, of course," she said.

"Who could forget?" He sat down. "You know, the Vongola has a great many resources, I'm sure they could do something for your voice, Luca."

Luca got his throat cut open by a two-bit gangbanger's knife some five years earlier. He survived, with his voice ruined and unable to speak without pain. The assailant had not walked away.

"Well, Luca?" Maria turned her head slightly toward him. This wasn't new, the Vongola trying to get the Eva under their control. It was a yearly occasion, at least, not helped by both the Eva and the Vongola's CEDEF both operating out of Milan.

Luca put on a mock-thoughtful expression, and said " _Huh-uh. Meks m'sund scry_." He signed it to Maria, that it makes him sound scary.

"And who is this associate of yours?"

"Cousin," she said without thinking. Then quickly (too quickly?) she added: "Mother's nephew."

"I see." Like everyone else in the bloodline, Iemitsu had Hyper Intuition. It wasn't as strong as his son's or the Ninth's, but it was strong enough to know when somebody was lying to him. Like right now, for instance.

He hadn't dropped in for a friendly chat, especially considering the last time he spoke to Eva's Third she had winged a glass at his head. She had been seen going into a meeting, one outside of her HQ, and he was obligated to keep an eye on potential threats outside of the Family.

"Do you know who I am?" Iemitsu said to Dante, a little patronizing to the man maybe ten years his younger.

"The Young Lion," Dante said in kind. He smiled politely. "Truly, an honor to make your acquaintance, would you care for a drink?" He indicated the champagne bottle.

"Oh, I really shouldn't. After all, I should clearly apologize for interrupting a family gathering."

Maria muttered into her glass. "More business than pleasure, anyways." Before he could press it, she said "We were just discussing the news of the hour, actually! The Vongola Decimo, selected at last. Although judging by how he's gone nameless, he must be young."

Neither of them missed how Iemitsu tensed.

"Young and impressionable," Dante added.

"Yes, he's being taught well," Iemitsu said stiffly.

"Really? According to my sources, he's being taught by the infant hitman. What a choice, I must say."

Iemitsu shifted in his seat, and made a note to investigate any possible leaks-how the _hell_ did this guy know who was teaching his son? He searched for a topic of conversation, and found it in the ring on Dante's hand. "Well, now that's an interesting emblem."

Dante went to snatch his hand back, and Iemitsu grabbed his wrist.

"That's a Locust, isn't it? Come here, Oregano, is this emblem what I think it is?"

Iemitsu was outnumbered, but he was worth three men and Dante wasn't a fighter.

Dante tried to pull himself free. "Just a gift from my uncle, let go-"

"No, I don't think so." His tone was hollow.

"The emblem does appear to be that of the Angelo, boss."

"I thought so. You're Adamo Terzo, aren't you? Dante?"

"He was the one who asked for this meeting, I had no idea what he wanted."

"Shut up. Tell me, Adamo, what makes you think you can wear this ring?"

"It's respect for tradition; back off, Gian, I can handle this!"

His ring sparked with Flame, and Maria launched herself across the table and tackled Dante so hard his seat tipped backwards. "You _idiot_ , you'll get everyone here killed! Damn it, what would Lilith say if she knew you used that!"

Dante grunted. "Lilith is _dead,_ and _you_ do not have permission to _speak her_ _ **name."**_ He pressed his open palm to her back, and the black stones lit up.

Maria's eyes clouded over, and her face contorted into pure horror, and as Dante pushed her off, she clutched her head with her hands and she _screamed_ bloody murder, a keen so shriek that Iemitsu flinched and Barbarossa covered his ears. Without a hint of emotion on his face, Dante stood up, brushed off his sleeve, and Maria curled in on herself and she was sobbing, saying " _No, no, no, please, please, no, no, no."_ Her breathing was ragged, she was hyperventilating.

Dante turned to Barbarossa.

" _I'm sorry, I'm sorry, forgive me, Luca…"_

The big man's presence encompassed the room. There was a pressure that kept them from moving, that stopped Tumeric in mid-stride when he went to examine Maria, that stopped Iemitsu reaching for his gun.

He moved to his boss, muttering and weeping and looking at things that weren't there. "Boss, 'm here. 'M fine." He put a gentle hand on her shoulder, but she didn't even seem to notice he was there. He looked at Dante with murder in his eyes. " _Fix 'er._ "

He seemed to choke on his words.

Luca spat at Dante. " _Fr yer sake, hope it fixes isself._ " He carefully picked her up in his massive arms, and she clung to him, weeping.

Iemitsu only just had the presence of mind to tell Oregano to move. She might have stayed there paralyzed otherwise.

Luca forced himself to speak without slurring his words, as painful as it was. "Think my boss would say, she'd never want to work with a power like that. Or that she'd kill you, shitboss. And I'll kill you if you _ever_ try to touch her again."

* * *

 _Cultural Notes:_

 _"Stop saying my name like that": without an honorific. She doesn't want to admit that she's a little attached to this monkey boy._

 _Mukuro Rokudou: said in the western fashion because they're Italian_

 _Extended 'o', as in Kyouko, Rokudou, Momokyoukai: technically, the correct spelling, which extends to the pronunciation. Don't be surprised if there's some irregularity. The same rule of extended vowels in romaji applies to Kokuyou, Ryouhei, Shouichi._

 _There's a good chance I will go back after Flame of Day part 1 is finished and do massive revisions._

* * *

 _A/N: And we have our other antagonist, the lovely Maria di Eva, and her nearly-mute right hand Luca._

 _Next time: featuring Angelo's Fourth, Vongola's Eighth, and a boy in black who will become the Greatest in the world. Target 22: What Happened on December 21, 1965?_


	22. 1965

_A/N: full chapter flashback, everybody. And possibly not the last one, either. I'm still deciding whether I want to write the second one._

 _The way I wrote Reborn in this chapter, it was based on the assumption that Reborn held a much more professional attitude toward Timoteo. I tried to keep the essence the same, but he's still fifteen years old in this chapter. Even after being with the Vongola since he was ten, he's still a mess of immaturity, inexperience, and hormones._

 **Target 22: 1965**

 **December 21, 1965**

Timoteo Traversini, 23 years old, looked on in pride at the boy turned to man, whose raw potential he had shaped into a fine work of art. That is, if killing was an art style.

There were still a few hitches, to be certain, but the boy was still only fifteen; he had time to work those out.

"Reborn," he said, tapping his foot impatiently. There was time, sure, but he wasn't going to be nice about failure or forgive stupidity.

"Yes, boss?" the boy said. He was 5'5'' tall, dressed immaculately, and visibly stiff in his stance, both hands folded behind his back, making the gun in his shoulder holster quite obvious.

"You're wearing two different shoes."

Reborn winced, looked at his feet, and saw that indeed, his right shoe was significantly more shiny than the left. "Oops."

"Well? Go get changed, and wear the matte ones. And do something with your hair, it's embarrassing."

He awkwardly ran a hand through hair that stuck up in every direction. The only method he had found for taming it required slicking it back, and that just felt disgusting. Like he had dumped a barrel of oil over his head. "Boss, there isn't much I can do…"

"Then wear a hat. Hold on-" Timoteo shut the door in his face, and returned a minute later with a black fedora that still had the size tag in the band. He set it on Reborn's head without a word, removed the tag, and looked him up and down. "I suppose it'll do. Come on, shoes, stop standing so stiff, the car is waiting."

Reborn adjusted the hat and took a deep breath. _Just another bodyguarding job, done it a hundred times, even if this is one of the biggest events I've been to. Just be cool and calm._ He forced himself to relax his stance, setting one hand in his pocket and let the other hang loose. Maybe he could use the brim of the hat to disguise how anxious he was.

When he ducked into the closet that could be generously called a room, given to him when he joined the Family five years earlier, he both changed his shoes, as well as went to the open glass tank in the corner. Leon chirped at his approach.

"If you can be still," Reborn said, as he removed his hat. He picked up his pet chameleon, intending to hide him under his hat, but Leon had an even better idea, and shape-shifted into a long and thin band that could wrap around the hat. "Geez, you're smarter than me. Like I said, don't move too much."

It wouldn't be the first time he took Leon while he was on the job, and after today it would be far from the last.

-0-

Junia nearly gagged when she caught sight of Timoteo coming down the steps all pompous, with that poor kid following in his shadow. Timoteo glanced at her, and wrinkled his nose like he had smelled something foul.

"Brother," she said, politely, although he would never acknowledge her as such. There were, after all, only half-siblings, as his own father had died when he was a child, and as expected of her the Eighth remarried and had her.

"What are _you_ doing here?"

"Meeting mother for dinner. Although, I suppose, it may be more proper to call her Ottavo."

"Oh?"

"Yes; I'm meeting, specifically, Ottavo and the Outside Advisor."

" _Oh?_ "

"Yeah. I'm looking at working with the Consulenza, hm? Thought you'd approve, since I could never inherit, then."

He frowned, grabbed his coat off the rack, and slipped it on. He nodded at Junia. She resisted the urge to roll her eyes.

Junia went off to meet the Eighth, as Timoteo and Reborn went to the waiting car for the party uptown.

"That old glue horse," Timoteo said of the man hosting the party, as Reborn checked the car and driver. The driver wore a ring with a simplified Vongola emblem, but more importantly, it was made with an alloy that reverberated in reaction to the Power of the Family. Reborn was, however, the only person outside the upper echelon who could use that power, the Dying Will Flame, and he'd never even been taught. At least as far as anyone knew, it was instinctive. The old bastard Talbot had denied teaching Reborn anything do to with a Flame, that winter five years earlier; he'd only tried to teach him the value of hard work. Timoteo wasn't sure whether or not to believe him.

"We're clear, boss."

"Good. Cavallone is waiting."

-0-

Angelo's Fourth was a man well used to getting what he wanted. It made it annoying when the damn Vongola heir showed up at Cavallone's gala. But, Jasper was good at hiding his emotions beneath a crooked smile and a puffed-out chest.

"Don Angelo," Timoteo said, hiding his disdain well. He looked at the young man beside Jasper, and his mask slipped. "Balthazar."

"Gramps," Balthazar said in kind, a jab at Timoteo's scepter. Beautifully crafted by Talbot for Timoteo, and resembling a cane even so. Balthazar had at least once gotten smacked with the business end.

Jasper smacked his son for the transgression, and dragged him away.

The glue horse, Cavallone's Eighth himself, opened the gala and sent out waiters with champagne. Somehow, the Eighth wasn't actually that old, he was only about fifty with a son that was only ten, but a lifetime of cigar smoking and gunfights gave him skin like leather and a very visible limp that required him to use a wheelchair half the time.

Timoteo wasn't the only one to find it a little pathetic.

-0-

"This is the day we take Italy for our own. When the sun rises, the heads of the strongest Families will be severed, and the wounds burned. And in chaos, we, the Bloody Agnello, will rise to power!"

-0-

Ottavo and her Sun Guardian were already waiting at the Entrare when Junia arrived. Daniela brightened at her daughter's approach, stood up, held out her arms, and pouted until Junia gave in and hugged her.

It was then that Scipio arrived, and they had to go back to professionalism.

Scipio was a Briton going gray, and he had been Daniela's Outside Advisor for eight years. They had been friends for all that time. Ever the consummate professional, Scipio had never allowed it to interfere with his position, and Daniela was happy to keep business and personal separate.

As the food was served in the private room, Scipio said "Have you received any training with the Dying Will Bullet?"

"I have not," she said.

"Hm. Given your heritage, I would assume you have a high affinity for the shot. Here," he said, and produced from one of his pockets a gleaming bullet.

Daniela shot him a glare. "Since when were you allowed to carry that around, hm?"

"Since when did one of your men keep a shape-change chameleon as a pet?" Scipio shot back. "The old man is the only one who keeps them, and even then I'm not quite sure about how aware he is."

She pursed her lips. "Talbot's the one who keeps the chameleons, and he's as sharp today as the day I met him. And according to him, the chameleon as much adopted Reborn as the boy became attached to him. Reborn doesn't even know about the existence of the Dying Will Bullet, anyways. It's not an issue."

"Uh-huh," Scipio said, clearly skeptical. He held out the bullet, unremarkable in every way. "Hold onto that for a second."

Junia took the bullet from him, a little disappointed when there was no dramatic light show. It was just a bullet that grew a little warm at her touch, but that alone seemed to please Scipio.

She offered it back to him.

At that instant, a bomb set beneath the table went off. Scipio died instantly, the Eighth Sun Guardian would be crippled for life, and the bullet went missing in the chaos.

-0-

By the time the bomb went off, Timoteo was moderately buzzed, and Reborn was his eyes and ears.

Reborn danced with a girl from another Family, for all appearances mingling but also watching for weapons, listening for whispered plots. He was there to protect his boss, but for the sake of image had to pretend that he was only a guest of Timoteo's. Not that anybody was fooled; every person there knew that he was a bodyguard. It was just another part of the mask; bringing a bodyguard to a party implied distrust in the hosts.

When Timoteo began bringing Reborn along to these parties as a bodyguard three years earlier, Reborn had found it immensely stupid, even if it became obvious that the only way he would make it anywhere would be to play by their rules. Neither Timoteo nor the Eighth found much strange about it. To Reborn, the logic was simple: Timoteo is the successor to a massive organization, which has a history of violence and being subjected to violence in order to advance interests. Having at least one bodyguard on hand was just being careful.

But, nobody really cared what a kid dressed up like a man twice his age thought. Reborn easily adjusted his tie and kissed his dance partner on the hand. She giggled, somebody's daughter who was two years older than him, but he was tall enough to pass for eighteen on these nights.

He went to move away, and she held onto his hand, smiling innocently. "Please, monsieur, may I have something to remember you by?"

She didn't even know his name, only knew him as a handsome young man in black with a flair for theatrics who smelled like espresso. Those who remembered him, that's all they knew him by.

He kissed her lightly on the lips. Her red hair smelled like strawberries. She had a knife in a scabbard on her thigh. She seemed so innocent, but they pulled apart, and in the moment before they broke away Reborn met her gaze, and saw the same edge as he saw in his mirror.

Timoteo had once called him a 'natural-born hitman'. He wondered if the red-haired girl was the same kind of person.

-0-

It was midnight before Timoteo decided he had mingled enough. He smelled of alcohol, and had taken off his tie and tucked it into his pocket. His scepter clinked against the cobblestones as he walked to the car.

"You ever have any regrets?"

"I'm sorry?"

"Regrets," Timoteo repeated. He set his scepter on his shoulder. "Things you wish had gone differently."

"Of course," Reborn said, frowning. "Remorse, it's only human."

"I disagree," Timoteo said. He had a lopsided sort of smile. "A great man will always do the right thing, and therefore has nothing to regret!"

Reborn stopped, Timoteo stopped a moment later, turned around, and looked at Reborn with the same lopsided smile. Reborn forced himself to say: "That seems a little egocentric, boss. Not even the greatest man will always make the best choice."

Timoteo's smile became a smirk, and suddenly his tilt seemed more like a relaxed, confident slouch. "And that's why I like you, Reborn. Naturally, I agree with you whole-heartedly. I just wanted to be sure that was your thought."

Reborn resisted the urge to give him a snippy remark for playing with him.

"So, things you've regretted," Timoteo said, as he continued walking to the car. "Like what?"

"Sorry, boss, but I'd rather not."

"Embarrassed?"

"No, just personal."

"Oh? Are you hiding something? Are you a spy after all?"

Reborn stopped, and his hands were balled so tightly his knuckles were white.

Timoteo stopped, and took a deep breath, and cursed. Maybe mother was right after all, about his mouth moving ahead of his brain. Reborn had never admitted much of his past, before coming to the Vongola in the spring of 1961. The Eighth had accepted this, said that she liked the look in his eyes, although Timoteo felt a tug of intuition that he was sure that his mother had shared, a magnetic attraction toward the boy, not that anyone without that ability would believe it. But even so, Timoteo had dragged a little out of Reborn; that he had been born into another Family, his father an enforcer for that Family, and Reborn, too, would have joined it if he hadn't left. He never said specifically what made him run away from home, but when he mentioned his father he became tense.

Reborn had only admitted that much when Timoteo threatened to fire him. Even a threat of death didn't push him, but being thrown away was enough to make him say anything about his past. Timoteo still wasn't sure what it meant that he was so averse to discussing his history.

It was for all of that history that Timoteo should have known that it wasn't right to refer to Reborn's past like it was a joke.

"Where's the car?" Reborn said quietly, snapping Timoteo out of his thoughts. "He was waiting here, wasn't he?"

"I...yes, yes he was."

Timoteo had the Vongola's Hyper Intuition protecting him from threats. Reborn had instincts like hell, and senses that he had trained every day for the past five years. It was he who had his gun out first, pointed at a man wearing a balaclava perched to drive a knife into Timoteo's back.

Reborn put a bullet in the assailant's head, and three more appeared to take his place from the shadows.

Timoteo had his scepter in hand, his eyes turned deep orange and narrowed in focus.

Reborn moved from one to the next, drove his elbow into the man's stomach and fired a bullet through his throat, the next Timoteo knocked in the sternum and swept off his feet, and drove the tip of his scepter into the back of his neck, and there was a crack as his spine broke, and Timoteo put him out of his pain with a bullet in the head.

The third moved quickly but Reborn was faster, meeting him beneath the streetlight, chopped at his neck with the side of his hand, and the assassin came at him with a knife, driving Reborn back but never touching him. Reborn let him get close once, and with new confidence the assassin dropped his guard to attack with all his strength. Reborn moved aside of the knife, grabbed the man's arm, and twisted it back at the elbow forty-five degrees in the wrong direction.

The assassin collapsed to the ground, twitching and whimpering in pain. Before Reborn could question him, a shot rang through the night. Reborn staggered, and red bloomed on his undershirt.

"Damn it, Reborn!" Timoteo shouted. "Come out, cowards! Let me see your faces before I kill you!"

Reborn was still on his feet somehow. "Boss, don't, agh, taunt them."

"Don't look so pathetic, and don't presume to give me orders." Timoteo holstered his pistol, took a deep breath, and in the center of his forehead an orange flame bloomed into existence. He turned over his scepter, and the tip was lit with the Vongola Dying Will Flame. "Get yourself together, there's still work to be done."

Reborn coughed. Leon had crawled onto his shoulder, and Reborn focused intensely on drawing out that strange power, focusing it on the bullet wound on his ribs. The bullet had hit a rib and ricocheted to the side and exited. Just meant stitching it together.

(It was significantly more complicated than that, but Reborn had a whole patchwork of scars from bad healing jobs. It would be decades before he learned that one could heal even bullet wounds without leaving severe scarring.)

His hand glowed with golden embers, and soon enough the bleeding was stopped. Reborn pulled himself up straight, still in pain but putting that aside to do his job.

From the shadows came four men, Big, Tall, Strong, and Stupid. Tall was the leader, judging by how they deferred to him. "Vongola," Tall said with a sneer.

Stupid raised his gun toward Timoteo, and Reborn put a bullet between his eyes.

"Who are you," Timoteo said, as he moved forward, spinning his scepter between his fingers like a baton. "And on whose behalf are you here?"

Big and Strong moved forward as one. Big had brass knuckles on his hands and seemed ready to use them to crush Timoteo's face into a pulp, but the Ninth dropped and drove the bottom of his scepter under Big's rib cage. Timoteo moved around him and took his scepter with both hands to deliver a heavy-handed blow to Big's spine, held it like a pool cue to drive it into his skull, and stamped on the back of Big's neck, and the big man was dead with a _crack._

Reborn might as well have not been injured, his wound wasn't slowing him down once he got into a rhythm with Strong. Strong had a combat knife, but that he was disarmed of quickly. He was too good on his feet for Reborn to put him on the ground, and Strong was quick to react whenever Reborn threatened to shoot him.

Out of the corner of his vision, he saw Tall moving toward his boss. _Looks like it's now or never for that one._ Reborn dropped back a step, and met Strong's gaze as he fired a bullet straight into the ground.

"That was the last one in the magazine!" Strong snarled, smiling maniacally. He charged at Reborn and landed a backhanded slap that knocked his hat off and sent him reeling back.

Timoteo just had time to register that Reborn had charged that bullet with Sun Flames when the ground started to crack beneath Strong.

"Chaos Shot," Reborn said, and a bullet flew out of the ground and grazed the side of Strong's neck, and blood spilled down from the carotid artery. Strong clapped a hand over his neck to try and stem the bleeding, and Reborn took that opening without hesitation.

Reborn moved forward, dropping his pistol, and Leon leaped into his hand and morphed into a knife. He grabbed Strong by the shoulder and forced him down and forward as he drove the point of the knife into his throat. Strong's eyes widened, and his mouth opened and blood spilled over his lower lip. Reborn removed the knife, and Strong fell to the ground dead.

Reborn just took the kerchief from Strong's breast pocket, and used it to clean first his hands, and then the blade of the knife. He tossed the kerchief away, and it landed in a pool of its owner's blood.

"I'll ask again," Timoteo said calmly. Tall was impassive. "Who are you?"

"The strongest person in my Family," Tall said, as he pulled on a pair of white gloves. "Told them it was a waste to send so many for this one. They'd die, anyways, to the would-be Ninth, and his pet."

Reborn loaded a fresh magazine and fired twice at Tall. The assassin raised his hand and the bullets bounced off of an invisible wall.

Timoteo needed barely more than a breath to pick up on the energy coming from the assassin-no, from his opera gloves. A solid object made from the force of the assassin's resolve, channeled through the silk gloves, probably a Family treasure. _Oh, what a mistake you've made. That power is the Vongola's, and only ours._

"Ready to die, Vongola? You're the last head that needs chopped off, and then we'll rule in the chaos of your passing."

Timoteo cursed. To Reborn he said: "I'll handle him alone. You need to find a phone; the Eighth's life may be in danger. Now!"

"Not a chance!" The assassin punched the air to create an indigo ball of energy that only just missed Reborn, hit the light pole, and knocked the entire fixture over.

When Reborn made no indication to follow the order, Timoteo snapped: "Go, now!" And he charged the assassin, easily moving aside a high speed projectile and swinging his scepter so hard that when it hit the assassin's invisible shield Sky Flames sprayed out to the sides.

Reborn owed the Eighth his life, but he owed the Ninth for giving him a reason to live.

But it was an order, and if he disobeyed it and the Eighth were in danger, he would wish he was dead. He holstered his gun and ran, vanishing into the shadows.

-0-

"What is your name?"

"Does it matter to a dead man?"

"Fine, your grave will go unmarked." Timoteo was parried by a barrier, nearly struck by another, and he got in close and stomped on the assassin's foot. While the man was stunned Timoteo struck him across the chin with the head of his scepter and forced the assassin to the ground. "Fool. Thinking you stand a chance. Daring to use the Vongola's power." He drove his heel into the base of the assassin's throat.

The assassin was turning blue. He struggled to no avail, and realized that he was going to die. Timoteo held his scepter across his chest, and his flame flickered irregularly. He had sent Reborn off for two reasons; the first, to protect the Eighth, and the second, to maintain the secrecy of a technique that had not been used in one hundred years.

The assassin could only watch as a layer of ice formed over his hands, down his arms, fixing him to the ground, and his scream was cut off halfway.

Timoteo stepped back to examine his unfortunate victim, encased in the Zero Point Breakthrough ice. He clicked his teeth in disappointment; the assassin was not in suspended animation, but dead. Perhaps less of a disabling technique than Primo's memoirs had made it seem. Still. A fair punishment for one who had dared to lay hands on the Vongola.

-0-

 **December 23, 1965**

Angelo Quarto and his son were dead, strangled with piano wire on the way home by their driver and an accomplice. A succession crisis was imminent.

The CEDEF was looking at selecting a new chief, who would be the Vongola's Outside Advisor.

The Eighth had bandages across her chest, but that didn't keep her from attending her friend's funeral and carrying the casket along with Scipio's two brothers, his uncle, and his two nephews.

The day of the funeral service, Junia wore black. When Timoteo came to the room she was staying in, she prayed that it wouldn't become a mess. "Yes?" she said.

"I, ah," he started, uncertain. He pulled his hat off. "I've been thinking. About us, and our family. I, haven't been kind to you." She was silent, but wasn't ignoring him. "With everything that has happened, I hoped to try and remedy that. I don't expect you to forgive me, but I'd like to try and build a relationship between us."

Junia hesitated for a long while as she processed. "Wow. I honestly never expected that. But uh...I just, can we talk more after Christmas? What with the funeral today, and I'm headed up to Rome tomorrow to spend Christmas with my boyfriend."

"Of course, of course, we can talk after Christmas. Get dinner, maybe."

"Yeah."

"Mm, excellent. So, ah, there's room in my car, if you'd care to join me?"

"Where's that kid who's always around?"

"Reborn? Oh, he's taking care of some business."

Junia rolled her eyes at the euphemism for what she could only assume was mass murder.

-0-

 **December 24, 1965**

" **Death at the Agnello House!**

" _On the night of December 23, emergency services were called when the Agnello House went up in flames. Police reports indicate that at least twenty bodies were found in the ruins, most of whom appear to have died of gunshot wounds. Evidence found on the scene as well as witness reports suggests the fire was started intentionally. The sole witness claims to have seen a 'man in black' exiting the building shortly before the fire started. Police representatives declined to comment on the possibility of the incident being gang-related."_

By the time Reborn returned to the Iron Fortress, most everyone was gone to Christmas Eve Mass. He had a single bullet tucked into his pocket, and a newspaper under his arm.

He knew it would be a waste to try sleeping. Instead, he went out to the garden, lit a cigarette, and stared up at the night sky. He didn't feel the cold, but he felt the faint warmth when the sun came up. He frowned at the rising sun, and went back inside to give the Eighth his report.


	23. The Cold Man

**Target 23: The Cold Man**

It was early December, and growing colder by the day, although it had yet to snow.

Tsuna was fairly comfortable with just a coat. He had only noticed this year that he seemed to naturally 'run hot' as he put it, a couple degrees above normal, and he never got cold any more. Most everyone else was in full winter coats, gloves, and hats already.

It was almost amusing to see Reborn, who usually just had a light coat at most and otherwise ignored the cold, wearing mittens, a winter hat, and a thick coat and still practically shivering, and grumbling whenever the wind picked up.

"I swear, you're as much cold-blooded as Leon is," Tsuna remarked, one morning when he was walking to school, Reborn walking on the wall as was his custom. Leon, meanwhile, had abandoned his master completely, and had climbed onto Tsuna and tucked himself under Tsuna's collar to escape the paralyzing cold.

Reborn muttered something incomprehensible, then "If you endanger my partner in any way it's on your head."

"Oh c'mon, I'm the last person who would mess with Leon," Tsuna said. "Fuuta even said this morning that I'm Leon's second-favorite human. Although that might just be because I'm apparently a walking furnace…"

"Considering he has the same affection for a spot of sunlight," Reborn said, although it was more out of some irrational jealousy than any actual reality. Leon did actually like Tsuna, probably because of the boy's comfort with reptiles and generosity with pieces of fruit, and that had been from day one. It was why Leon was willing to shape-change at Tsuna's request, he'd never been willing to do it even for Dino, who loved reptiles.

And in sharp contrast, there was Reborn's student before Dino, the _wonderful_ second son of the Ninth, Massimo, who hated reptiles, and thought he was smarter than Reborn and whose tutelage was cut short by his untimely death. Reborn had always been quite open with the Ninth about how Massimo, in the few months that he had been Reborn's student, had not once listened. If he had, he would have known to not mess with yakuza and gotten drowned in Tokyo Bay.

Caught up in his thoughts, Reborn just absently followed the road to the school, going from wall to railing as they came to the bridge. The entire bridge was slick from early icing.

"Alright, I guess it's a little cold," Tsuna admitted, crossing his arms over his chest and tucking his head down. He brought it up again when he heard rapid footsteps approaching from behind and looked over his shoulder. "Haru?"

"Tsuna-saan!" she shouted out, waving wildly as she came up to them. The instant her foot came down on the icy bridge, she slipped, lost her balance, and came careening across the ground head-over heels. She stopped only when she slammed into the railing hard enough to make a ringing sound.

The impact made the railing shake, and Reborn felt his feet moving under him. He felt himself falling, and windmilled his arms trying to stay up, but his center of gravity was too high. He saw Tsuna reach out for him just as he dropped from the bridge.

Reborn didn't even have time to think before he hit the surface of the river. He went under and was instantly numbed by the shock of the cold. Water weighed down his clothes and he couldn't even _think_ and he breathed in a mouthful of water, and his face broke the surface for a moment and he was under again, the current throwing his useless little body around like a child's lost toy. He was tumbling over, his arms thrashing, trying to get purchase on anything _if I had Leon if I weren't so small and useless_ and his head struck on a rock at the bottom of the river, and he saw stars.

There was a sound like something hitting the water _am I going to watch myself drown? Is that it? Am I going to die here and drown over and over again?_ and he broke the surface another time but didn't even have time to cough, and he was under again, thrown past rocks. His foot got caught between two, not long enough to stop him but plenty long enough to wrench his ankle. His head hit another rock, and _bleeding bleeding head wounds always bleed this isn't what's important right now I'm going to die after all._

 _The Cold Man never stopped, only let off a while until he could grab me again._

A thick branch in the river struck him in the forehead, and he knew nothing.

-0-

 **January 5, 1960**

 **Inizio, a town in the Italian Alps**

Footsteps across the thoroughfare, prints leading up to the doors of the church, then away when nobody answered, but these were already blurred by the falling snow.

It was Twelfth Night, and the boy with no name was all alone in the world and freezing to death. He had a threadbare black coat, meant more for early fall than the coldest winter in recorded history. Snow stood out against hair the color of ink; his coal black eyes were dead.

His limbs were like lead, but he still felt the pain of the cold, like needles across every inch of exposed skin. The air felt thin, breathing was agony on his overworked lungs. He tried to breathe warmth into his hands, but it did nothing. He dragged his feet through the snow, and he fell and couldn't stand up, but still he crawled.

Through the streets of Inizio, a shadow of a man with hands made of ice followed the boy with no name. The boy couldn't ever see the Cold Man, but he caught a glimpse when he looked over his shoulder, saw His horribly white teeth in the shadow, saw how windows and breath froze with His passage. There were so many people, but He had eyes only for the boy with no name; He couldn't pass through doors, but the boy was on the verge of collapse, and the Cold Man comes in your sleep.

"No," was all the boy with no name could say, and only whispered, breathed. He tried to slap himself, keep himself awake, but his arm wouldn't move right, and he had gone numb. His fingernails clawed through ice. Without realizing it, he had stopped, curled up against the brick wall, snow collecting on his head and arms and knees.

His face was blue, and the cold, the _cold_ , everything was ice. His arms were wrapped around him, but nothing kept out the cold. He imagined that he might turn to ice, and his finger would snap off like an icicle off the roof of a gutter. He might have laughed in encroaching madness, but it was all he could do to keep breathing.

The Cold Man kept coming, and wasn't even trying to hide. His teeth were white and His eyes were white. He whispered with a voice like the wind through pipes " _Sleep now, boy, sleep and know no more."_

He could. He wanted to. If he had known what fate had in store for him, he might have just rolled over and died there, let the Cold Man wrap his fingers around his heart, and leave his body to be found when the next thaw came.

He would later be glad that he didn't. He bit down on his own thumb, nearly drew blood, awakening his senses just for an instant at the pain, and he spat at the Cold Man's feet.

The Cold Man's smile vanished, and He too disappeared on a gust.

The boy with no name felt the last of his energy leave him, and his eyes closed just as somebody came around the corner.

-0-

It smelled of wool and wood smoke when he woke, alive.

He pushed himself up. He was on a mat, in front of a grated fireplace, with a thick blanket covering him.

"Don't move too much, you'll end up dying anyways."

He jumped at the sound, and looked at the old man sitting at a work table, working a piece of metal with a file.

"Who are you?"

The old man replied by lifting his cane and poking him in the head with it. The boy realized then that the old man's eyes were cloudy; he was blind. "That's some way to say 'thank you.' Found you under a pile of snow, was so surprised you were alive I brought you back here. Wasn't sure if you'd survive or not."

"Thank you."

"Better."

The boy looked around. They seemed to be in a small workshop, rustic and traditional and organized, if a bit full of shelves with raw materials and finished pieces of metalwork alike; everything from custom revolver handles to lockets and watches.

Somewhat out of place was the spinning wheel in the corner, an old manually operated kind instead of an electric one. A basket full of raw wool was set on the chair in front.

And even more out of place was a glass tank with several reptiles with curly tails crawling around inside. The boy stood, went up to the tank, and kneeled down to take a look inside. "Chameleons?"

"Aye. How old are you, boy? You sound young."

"I'm nine."

"How does a nine year old end up in an alley on Twelfth Night nearly freezing to death?"

"It's...a long story."

"I have nothing but time."

He frowned, but made no comment on the man's age. He looked back at the tank; one of the half-dozen chameleons, the smallest of the bunch, had crawled up on a stick and was looking at him. "I guess it's not that long. Can I pet this one? He's looking at me."

"Is it the small one? Go ahead."

He reached in and rubbed his finger along the chameleon's back. It responded by crawling onto his hand. He smiled and lifted it out. It made an odd noise like a chirp when he rubbed under its chin.

"My father tried to kill me. I left before he could get sober enough to succeed," he said.

"And so you tried to kill yourself by sitting out in the coldest winter on record, in a snowstorm."

"Something like that."

"What's your name?"

"..."

"What do I call you, then?"

The chameleon crawled up his arm, balanced perfectly even on loose fabric. "Reborn. That works."

"Hmph. Talbot is my own. Whereabouts are you from, Reborn?"

-0-

 **Now**

Sometimes Tsuna's Hyper Intuition was a whisper or a nudge. At that moment, it was more like a siren, and his own hands moving without conscious thought.

Within half of a breath, before Haru had even fully grasped what had happened, Tsuna had dropped his backpack and was in the middle of pulling his jacket off. In the next instant, she had gone to the railing and saw Reborn being swept away by the current and shrieked, and Tsuna vaulted over the railing and jumped into the river.

Haru grabbed up Tsuna's jacket and shoes and ran down the river bank after them.

-0-

If he were in hell, then he wouldn't have fallen unconscious and he would still be in the water. He coughed, and again, and brought up water. He fumbled at his collar, trying to get it loose enough to breathe, and somebody put their hand on his and got the front of his coat undone, and pulled it off gently. Somebody was warm, and they went to pull away from him, but he latched on as he tried to get his breath. The Cold Man had his bony fingers in his chest, but when somebody stopped pulling away and put his arms around him, the Cold Man was gone, away from the heat, and he could breathe again.

"Give me my jacket," somebody said, and he was still wet through his hair in his face and his clothes soaked, but it was good anyways when somebody wrapped a too-big coat around him. He tried to keep his eyes open even as he buried his head in somebody's chest. Somebody was warm, like the space in front of the fireplace or a spot of sunlight through a window. "Need to get home five minutes ago, or he'll be sick as hell or worse, he'd kill me for saying it but he's so small he could die from a shock like that. Where's my, my bag…"

"I've got it here, I'll carry it, let's go. Come on, come on, the sooner the better."

He needed to stay awake, the Cold Man comes in your sleep, but it was so warm, so warm, and somebody seemed to know...to know...to have everything...to keep everything okay. To keep it all...okay...seemed safe enough, being with him.

-0-

Certainly, Sawada Nana had not woken up this morning expecting that less than twenty minutes after he left for school, Tsuna would return to find him carrying Reborn, both of them soaking wet and blue from the cold, and Haru with them and seeming to be on the verge of freezing herself after giving Tsuna her coat. Reborn was only barely conscious, and was clinging to Tsuna desperately trying to drive out the cold.

"Oh, God! What in the world, did you fall in the river?"

"He fell," Tsuna said, even as he moved past her. "I jumped. I'll clean up the water in a minute, Reborn's out from the shock."

"You-oh, never mind the water, come on, we'll get you out of those clothes, quickly now."

-0-

Reborn woke what felt like hours later, and he was tired but not in the tired like sleep would help way, more like tired in the fell in a river and almost died _again_ way.

He realized next that he was laying on a bed, under covers, with a lion cub on one side and Tsuna on the other with his arm over Reborn, and as warm as it was he was increasingly uncomfortable from being in close contact.

He tried to move, but he couldn't go far. "Tsuna," he said, his voice coming out like a creak. He shivered involuntarily, it wasn't even that cold and _shit_ he was getting sick wasn't he?

Tsuna heard him and moved his arm and pulled away. "Sorry, you just wouldn't stop shaking." He had his phone open in one hand; he hadn't been sleeping, he had been texting someone while lying in bed trying to keep Reborn warm. He stood from the bed, and sat down properly on the edge to give him space. "How are you feeling?" he ventured.

Reborn had to think about it for a long moment. Just when he was ready to give a usual "I'm just fine, leave me alone", his stomach turned over and it felt like he was on a boat on the open sea. Then he was back in the river, gasping for breath, sure he would die. "I, I," his voice creaked like an old door, "think I'm going to be sick."

Tsuna passed him a pot from the kitchen. It still smelled like soap. There was a hand rubbing circles on his back, and Reborn couldn't remember the last time he had been in such a state.

"Just take all the time you need. You're human, just like the rest of us."

Reborn used the hand towel hung on the handle to clean himself off, and said "Where is, is Leon?" His voice was starting to come back.

"Sleeping on my head," Tsuna said, as he reached up and poked Leon, who was tucked into his hair. Leon came awake, licked Tsuna's finger, and realized then that his master was awake at last, and he crawled onto Tsuna's hand. Tsuna lowered his hand and Reborn held out his arm and clicked his teeth. Leon moved onto Reborn's arm, and was quickly curled around his shoulders.

"Sorry to worry you," he said, petting Leon under his chin.

"He was freaking out a little. Didn't care about the cold, just wanted to be sure you were okay."

"How long have, have I been asleep?" It had to have been decades since he stuttered or stammered.

"In all about three hours, but you weren't quite out when we got back here."

Reborn wracked his brain, and shook his head. "I must have been, been running on instinct. I don't remember anything after...after…" and he realized just who he had been clinging to.

Tsuna rubbed the back of his head, and said "Sorry, but I did call Shamal, I was worried. He isn't coming unless you think it's needed, though."

"No, no." His body screamed in protest, but his pride demanded it. A sudden chill made him shudder, set his teeth chattering and he wrapped his arms around himself.

Tsuna stood up. "Nuts, stay here. I'm gonna go take Haru up on her offer to borrow a space heater."

"Tsuna-"

"Don't even try, your temperature is still uncomfortably low and you're getting sick."

"I wasn't t-trying t-to argue. I was just going say, thank you."

"Oh. Uh...don't worry about it."

-0-

When he woke up next, he still felt the chill to his core that wouldn't leave. His feet were numb, but that was because Nuts was laying across his legs. He carefully pulled himself free, and sipped from the glass of water left on the nightstand.

A chill hit him, and as he pulled the blankets up around his shivering form he almost missed not once becoming ill in thirty years. Almost. Not really. He'd rather nearly drown a hundred times. His hands were still too small.

Only then did he realize that the door was cracked open, and he wondered how long it had taken him to notice. "Yes?" he ventured.

It came open a little more, and pink-faced I-pin poked her head in a little uncertainly. "Um...mamma asked me to bring food…" She was carrying a bowl of steaming hot soup on a tray.

"I d-don't think that-t-t's the best idea," Reborn said, his teeth chattering on the hard consonants.

That only seemed harden her resolve. "You'll feel better if you have something." She pushed the door open, carefully balancing the tray as she crossed the room and set the tray on the bed.

Reborn took the spoon and absently stirred the noodle soup, but didn't try to eat.

"Um." I-pin produced a well-worn pack of playing cards from one of her pockets. "Would you like to play again?"

He breathed heavily as he really considered it. Some year earlier he had agreed to play mahjong with I-pin when she was ill with a summer cold. Over an hour she won eight of thirteen games.

Then in the Future, Reborn had been in far worse shape than he had let on, even in the base he was constantly fatigued and any time not spent training Yamamoto or eating, he was sleeping to little avail. I-pin had noticed his condition, offered to play mahjong with a deck of cards made from printer paper, and he accepted to appease her. By the end of two months, the record was 207-156 in I-pin's favor. It kept his mind sharp, and distracted her from the situation. Though, he still felt a little guilty for the times he passed out in the middle of a game, and her helping him to a bed in his weakness.

But it made him aware of just what potential I-pin had. She was intelligent for her age, had to be to beat him so well, and he met few people who impressed him so well. To the point where he had discussed with Fon the possibility of Reborn taking her as a student, or even as an apprentice. She was clever, perceptive, skilled, and strong, for her age. Fon had asked that he wait until she was older and more worldly before broaching the topic. Reborn had agreed without argument.

But he could still encourage her to develop her mind. Whether she was a hitman or a college student in ten years, it would serve her well to be able to strategize now.

He slid the bowl off to the side so that they could play on the tray. _Useless, useless, useless, barely have the energy to sit up straight._

-0-

Tsuna sneezed and loudly, and groaned. "Ugh, I think I'm getting sick. Thanks," he said sarcastically to Reborn. When Reborn looked uncomfortable instead of firing back with an insult, he added: "Yeah, if I had just let you drown, I would have avoided this mild inconvenience." Nothing. "I should have pushed Haru in after you."

That was it, Reborn fixed him with an irritated glare. "And I would have killed you had I survived, or haunted you if I didn't."

Tsuna coughed. "I bet you could find a way to shoot me as a ghost." He coughed into the crook of his elbow. "I'm sure of it."

"I should teach you a lesson just for considering it," he said, although making no motion to move from his spot, shivering under a blanket. "Go study, _Dame_ -Tsuna, I expect an eighty on that exam."

"Yeah, yeah, everyone's coming to study for science," Tsuna said, and smacked himself. "No, what am I thinking, I don't want everyone else getting sick!" He looked over at Reborn again, coughing into his arm. "Okay, I'm gonna call everyone, uh, in an hour when they get out of school, you get some sleep."

Reborn might have disciplined Tsuna for trying to tell him what to do, but he also rather needed some more sleep. He fell back onto the pillow and shivered again.

-0-

They came over to Tsuna's house anyways, everyone who had to deal with Nezu as their science teacher. Tsuna, Gokudera, Yamamoto, Chrome, Kyouko, and Hana, in all.

Outside, the temperature was dropping even more, and it had started to snow once the sun went down. The house was cold as well; the space heater didn't work very well, and Nana was using the kotatsu downstairs. That left Gokudera and Yamamoto suffering in silence, the latter even putting on his coat.

Kyouko and Chrome were less reserved, and were huddled together under a blanket. Hana somehow seemed unaffected, although she also had four layers on. Tsuna had only a hoodie on, but I-pin and Lambo had come into the warmest room in the house and were sitting on either side of him. Fuuta had sat down between Gokudera and Yamamoto, in order to amend his rankings.

Yamamoto had leaned over to look at the rankings and Tsuna had shot a look at him, although even if he had looked it would have been incomprehensible; Fuuta had started writing his rankings in shorthand, in French, for his own sense of security. Reborn was the only other person in the house who knew French, and he couldn't read that form of shorthand.

Speaking of Reborn, he was sitting on the bed shivering under a blanket, a mask over his mouth and nose at Maman's insistence. He was more than anything else irritated at his own illness, but he didn't have the coordination required to, say, smack Tsuna lightly when he made a stupid mistake on his work.

He might have refrained from hitting Tsuna anyways, given that Tsuna had without any prompting summoned Nuts and instructed him to sit next to Reborn. While Reborn was bigger than Nuts these days, it was still quite helpful for the cold.

"What's you get for balancing the nuclear reaction?" Tsuna said, as he kept frowning at his scratch paper.

Gokudera read off his answer, and leaned over to check Tsuna's different answer. "It's 3 Helium-4, Tenth."

Tsuna erased and tried it again. He got the same answer. "Stupid, stupid."

"You are, yes," Reborn said, and got a glare even as he continued. "There's no d-d-difference between this and the other balancing k-k-k-chemical equations. Write down what's involved, including the p-p-protons and neutrons."

"Reborn, do you need us to go in another room?"

"I'm fine. Now do the problem right."

Tsuna started on a fresh sheet of paper and wrote out the problem that needed solved, and under it wrote a P for Proton and an N for Neutron. He worked through it slowly, first counting up then writing down the number of particles on each side, then adding coefficients to give the same number on each side.

He compared it to Gokudera's answer, and sighed in relief when he had it correct. "I just hope I can remember for the exam."

"You'll do just fine, Tsuna-kun," Kyouko said brightly.

"Assuming the bastard Nezu doesn't pull something," Gokudera said, and Tsuna winced at the thought. "How the hell did he even get his job back?"

"He blackmailed the principal," Hana said, not even looking away from her practice problems.

Kyouko frowned, and set her pencil down. "How do you know that? Hana, did you hack the school computers?" she said disapprovingly.

"Apparently some of the teachers are running betting pools on student relationships," Hana said, dodging the question. "Definitely not appropriate. He threatened to go to the school board."

There was a round of disgusted noises. Tsuna made a mental note to talk to Kusakabe about it, there was no way that was allowed.

"It's snowing outside," Chrome said, and eyes went to the window as though they couldn't believe her, but it was true. It had been snowing a while without them realizing it, and it was cold, dark, and windy out. Early in the winter for a snowstorm.

"Maybe the storm will knock out the power at the school," Tsuna suggested, and then he remembered that his house also lost power when the school did, and that was less than appealing.

"Might have to cut this short," Yamamoto said, his smile slipping. "I'd rather not walk home if it gets any worse, yeah? Sorry to run off."

"Don't apologize, I should get going too," Kyouko said, even as she was picking up her study supplies.

"My apologies, Tenth."

"Go, Gokudera-kun, it's getting bad out."

Yamamoto was the first out the door; less than a minute later, he had returned looking a little dazed, a lot windblown, and covered in snow. He was smiling again. "Yo, Tsuna, can I stay over tonight? It's really cold outside, haha."

Tsuna laughed lightly. "Yeah, it'll be fine. Gokudera? Chrome, Kyouko, Kurokawa?"

Chrome nodded in gratitude, Gokudera looked uncomfortable but he didn't decline. Kyouko nodded and said "Thanks, Tsuna-kun, I'll just need to call home or oniichan will get worried." With Kyouko's answer confirmed, Tsuna didn't even have to look at Kurokawa to know that she wouldn't leave Kyouko and Chrome alone with three boys.

-0-

Nana had already been prepared to keep anyone from trying to leave in this weather when she learned that Tsuna had taken care of it.

"Bianchi-chan?" she said as she cracked the door. There were two guest rooms in the house, due to her apparently mistaken assumption that she might have another child. Well, in a way she did, but not in the way she expected. Bianchi had the smaller room, but she had it to herself.

"Yes, maman?"

"Tsu-kun's friends are staying the night, could the girls borrow some PJ's from you?"

"Mmhm, just give me a second."

Nana stepped into the room, closed the door, and said "Is everything alright?"

Bianchi winced. She pulled out a three-pack of yoga pants that had never been worn, and a few t-shirts. "I'm fine."

"I see. Sorry, I thought it looked like you had been crying, but I guess it was the light." It wasn't the light, Bianchi's eyes were red and her face was splotchy. "If you ever need anything, you can come talk to me. You know that, right?"

She bit her lip. "I'm just a little tired. Stress."

"Don't I know that feeling," Nana said sympathetically. "If you like, I could make a bit of tea, always helps me when things get difficult."

Bianchi wiped her eyes and nodded. "Thank you, mamá."

"Of course, it's what I'm here for."

-0-

The guests slept in the family room. Originally Gokudera and Yamamoto were going to sleep in Tsuna's room, but the girls were freezing cold in the family room so Tsuna insisted that they get the space heater, which chased Gokudera and Yamamoto out, both of them sleeping on the floor while Chrome was in a bright pink sleeping bag and Kyouko and Hana were on the couch and recliner respectively.

By eleven, most of the lights were off, and Nana had made tea for Bianchi, and everyone was falling asleep, and she was making one last round to make sure everyone was comfortable.

It was so much colder than usual. _I wonder, maybe they did the insulation wrong when the house repaired after that…_ She frowned. _When the roof was...when the roof was...broken, right?_

She felt a prickle in the back of her mind, and for some reason thought about that nightmare she had had, some months earlier, after passing out from stress.

 _The phantom, attacking Iemitsu, trying to attack me._

But it was a dream. Just a bad dream.

She put extra blankets on Gokudera and Hana, and headed upstairs. Before going to her own room, she cracked the door of Tsuna and Reborn's room.

Tsuna was in a sleeping bag on the floor, quite comfortable. He had given his bed to Reborn.

She set another blanket over Reborn. He was coughing, and had his arms over his stomach like it hurt when he coughed. It probably did.

She brushed his hair out of his face, and he relaxed at her touch. She moved away, and kneeled down beside Tsuna.

She set the back of her hand on his forehead, but he wasn't too much warmer than usual. She kissed him on the forehead, and slipped out of the room.

-0-

At 3 AM, Gokudera came awake at a clicking sound.

Yamamoto tapped his shoulder. He looked serious. Very quietly, he said "Somebody's trying to pick the lock on the front door."

"How do you know that?" Gokudera hissed, equally quietly.

Yamamoto had his sword laying beside him. He pulled himself into a crouching position. He moved forward silently, touched Chrome on the shoulder, and touched a finger to his lips as she came awake. "Somebody's trying to get in."

She woke Kyouko and Hana, keeping them quiet as Gokudera and Yamamoto crept toward the door.

The clicking sound stopped, and the doorknob rattled. The whole door shook as they tried to force it open. It shook again, and Gokudera sidled up beside the door.

The door swung open to a massive dark shadow, and Gokudera leaped onto him and grabbed him with his arms under the intruder's shoulders and hands tucked behind his neck; the intruder _roared_ , and effortlessly flipped Gokudera over his shoulder and onto the ground.

Yamamoto charged forward and brought his sword down over the intruder's head, only for the man to grab his sword with his bare hand, pull it away, and kick Yamamoto back.

"Bastard!" Gokudera shouted as he pulled out a stick of dynamite.

The lights came on, and all three were blinded momentarily.

Tsuna and his mother were halfway down the stairs, woken by the noise.

"Iemitsu!" Nana said at the sight of her husband.

Everyone hid their weapons when the lights came on. Iemitsu smiled awkwardly, brushed the snow out of his hair, and said vivaciously "Nana!"

"Dad," Tsuna said flatly. "What the hell are you _doing_ here?"

* * *

 _Cultural Notes_

 _Very few Japanese homes have a furnace. It gets cold, especially if insulation is poor, and the house is going to be freezing._

* * *

 _A/N: It occurred to me that it might seem like Tsuna misses a lot of school, but really he doesn't. From mid-October to early December, he's missed two days of school. This, when he was sick, and when he was saving Fuuta. It's just that both were over the course of like five chapters._

 _To be honest I don't remember whether or not we did the basics of nuclear chemistry in freshman science, but I seem to recall at least touching on it._


	24. Fatherhood

**Target 24: Fatherhood**

Gokudera went to the floor apologizing for waking Tsuna, but offered no such manner to Iemitsu for putting him in a full nelson.

It was three-thirty before anyone was back in their beds, and Tsuna didn't get a chance to interrogate his father.

Class started at 8:00, most everyone had left by seven, but Gokudera, Yamamoto, and Chrome had returned at an invitation for waffles.

Tsuna came downstairs ready to go at quarter past, and though Reborn still felt sick as a dog he kept up readily.

It was quarter past seven, and his father already had a beer in hand. "Yoo, Tsuna!" His cheeks were ruddy red, and there were bruises on his neck from where Gokudera had grabbed him.

Tsuna blinked. He's not really drunk…but his face is all red?

"Iemitsu," Reborn said, and thank god he didn't stutter on it.

"Reborn," Iemitsu said, sounding far less cheerful.

Tsuna squinted, licked his thumb, and wiped at his father's cheek before he could realize what Tsuna was doing, and the makeup he was wearing came off in a streak.

"Hey, hey, what's that for?!"

"You're wearing blush to make it look like you're drunk?" Tsuna said incredulously. "Why are you so weird?!" He shook his head. "Clean that off, you look like an idiot. More so than usual."

Gokudera pushed a plate of waffles into Tsuna's hands, and pulled out a chair for him. "Is there anything I can get for you, Tenth?"

"I'm fine, eat your own food."

Iemitsu rubbed at his face with the back of his hand. "Never thought I'd see the day when Dokuro was the healthiest-looking of you kids," he said, as he glanced at Chrome. She put her head down to stare intently at her food, pale skin blushing with color.

"Really, dad? You couldn't have just said 'everyone looks sick today'?"

"What in the world happened to you," he said as he pointed his fork at Reborn, who had declined food in favor of a lukewarm glass of water. He had coughed through the night, so he was exhausted, and it showed in his relative silence.

Though Reborn had intended to pretend he hadn't heard Iemitsu, it was then that Nana entered with plates for I-pin and Lambo and said, "Didn't I tell you? Reborn-kun fell in the river yesterday, oh, it was horrible! Tsu-kun brought him in and they were blue from the cold-oh, but Haru told me, how our Tsu-kun jumped in after Reborn!" She had set her hands on Tsuna's shoulders, gave him a big kiss on the top of his head, and said "My little hero!" with a dreamy look in her eyes.

Tsuna was grumbling as he tried to pull away without actually leaving his seat, insisting that it wasn't as much as she made it out to be.

Meanwhile, Iemitsu was simultaneously putting on a proud father face and throwing a glare at Reborn that nobody, not even Nana, missed.

-0-

"Wait, what?" Yamamoto said, scratching his head.

"It was like-" and Tsuna mussed up his eyebrows, smiled painfully, and turned his gaze at Kyouko, raised his brow, and tried to make his smile look more forced.

Kyouko looked up and met his stare straight on, and Tsuna broke away with a laugh.

"So what's your dad's deal, anyways?" Hana said, as she pushed the rest of her food toward Kyouko, who in turn gave it to Chrome, who stared at it and shifted uncomfortably.

"Chrome, I'm really sorry again, he's a jerk sometimes," Tsuna said, and Chrome nodded without looking at him.

"What happened?" Kyouko said, leaning forward.

"He, uh, my dad, made a stupid comment about Chrome-I shouldn't be saying anything, sorry."

Yamamoto shook his head. "He made a comment about her health."

"Oh, gross!" Hana said with a sneer. "Nothing but an overgrown monkey."

Tsuna swallowed the last mouthful of his food. "I just wish he would stop dodging around when I try to get him to say why he's here. There's no way it's because he wanted to see anyone."

"Could he be looking at those guys wanting Justice?" Yamamoto suggested.

Tsuna frowned. "I...maybe? But he didn't come running any other time weird stuff went down, unless he was involved because of his work." He ran a hand through his hair. "He just got here and I already want him gone."

"You could stay at my place again, if you want," Yamamoto offered, but Tsuna shook his head.

"No, it's not like last time, I'll just...put on a happy face. I don't care what he thinks, but my mom still loves him, and he still makes her happy." He sighed. "And if I'm not there nobody'll be around to keep him from giving Fuuta, Lambo, and I-pin alcohol…" He sipped at his water bottle.

Kyouko blinked. "I'm sorry, Tsuna-kun, I think I misheard you, could you repeat that?"

"He gave the kids sake at least once, and would have done it again if I didn't cut in," Tsuna said, rubbing his forehead. Everything's weird and I barely even question it anymore.

-0-

Nana had insisted that Reborn stay in still, as he was still quite clearly sick, shivering, and coughing, and cold cold cold why does it all have to be so cold?

Around noon, Nana left the house to get groceries, and Iemitsu had feigned sleep to keep from getting pulled out with her.

Reborn had been expecting him to try and corner him, eventually. "Is there a problem?" he said, when Iemitsu entered and closed the door to Tsuna's bedroom.

"Where's your report?" Iemitsu said, his hands in his pockets and his eyes dark.

Reborn considered him for a moment, and had to think about what the date was, and yes, his report was a few days overdue. "Interesting that you're so concerned as to show up in person. But, if you're so concerned about his progress, Tsuna has continued to develop his unique Flame combination technique. Since the rescue of Fuuta, he has been more anxious than usual, which is detrimental to his physical and mental performance, but that anxiety is relieved when in the presence of his Guardians, who have almost universally moved to support their boss. I heavily recommend that the Tenth attend Namimori High School next year-"

"I don't care about the report!" Iemitsu snapped. "I'm more concerned with how you seem to have forgotten your place."

Reborn might have laughed at that. Instead, he coughed, adjusted his hat, and said, "Think very carefully about what you're going to say, Iemitsu."

"You've slacked off on his training," Iemitsu said stiffly. "You've allowed him to screw around. You've put him in danger."

"If you're referring to the swim I took yesterday," Reborn said dryly. "There is only one person responsible for Tsuna jumping in, and that was Tsuna himself. Nobody told him to be an idiot, he's just naturally prone to putting himself in harm's way for other's sake."

"Knowing your past, you of all people should have reason to break that habit of his."

Reborn's anger cut through the cold but he didn't let it show. "I'd say his father would have even greater reason."

"Except that I'm not the one teaching him, you are. For now, at least."

"And what's that supposed to mean?"

"It means that unless I have significant proof otherwise, when I return to Italy and give my report to the Ninth, I will recommend that Tsuna be brought to Italy and I will teach him there."

Iemitsu never struck me as a plotting type. And probably for good reason, neither Timoteo nor Tsuna will pay his 'recommendation' more than a passing thought. "Best of luck with that."

"You don't think anything will come of it."

"And you do?"

"Times are changing, Reborn. The world has continued to move on, not just in eight months, but in two years, thirty years, fifty years, it's changed."

"I'll keep that in mind."

"You should."

-0-

Tsuna didn't head home right after school; instead, he went up to the Reception Room, knocked on the door, and entered. Hibari was there, and he threatened a smile when he saw it was Tsuna.

Hibari pushed his papers aside and interlaced his fingers on top of the desk, waiting for Tsuna to approach.

Tsuna grabbed a chair, sat down across from Hibari, and pulled out a folding Go board and two Tupperware containers with game pieces stored inside. Hibari took the white pieces and Tsuna made the first move.

When he made several poor moves in a row, Hibari narrowed his eyes at Tsuna. "Sawada Tsunayoshi, I expect undivided attention."

"Uh, oh, sorry." Tsuna reconsidered his move, set a piece down, and waited.

A few more moves, and then: "What's your father like, Hibari-san?"

The killing intent nearly made Tsuna fall off his chair, and then it was gone as suddenly as it appeared.

Hibari made a move. "My father paid a woman named Tsubo Nani seven-hundred and fifty thousand US dollars to carry a child to term. He believes he is going to kill me in two years."

Almost fell off his chair again. "Oh."

Tsuna rolled a stone over his knuckles. React appropriately and it would just push Hibari away. But he couldn't just ignore it, either. And even if the intent of his words was right, if he screwed up the wording then it would just frustrate Hibari.

So he said a question instead of a statement. "Is he strong?"

Hibari played with the game piece in his hand. "Yes, he is." An almost imperceptible hitch in his voice.

He's afraid, afraid of his father! What kind of sick person is he? Well the kind that would kill his son, apparently!

The game went on. Tsuna took territory, and Hibari returned to his usual apathy (serenity?).

He said that his father thinks he's going to kill him. So Hibari is planning on fighting back.

They counted up the point total, and Tsuna won by seven-and-a-half points, but it didn't really feel like an accomplishment. Tsuna packed up the board and game pieces. A thought hit him, and he almost smiled.

"Thank you for the game, Hibari-san," he said. "If there's ever anything I can do for you, I'll, um, I'll pass on my number to Kusakabe-san the next time I see him."

"Hn." But he didn't seem irritated, so Tsuna was pretty sure he'd done well.

-0-

Tsuna left the school with more problems than when he had entered, but Hibari's meditative serenity (apathy?) seemed contagious. He had thoughts for how he was going to talk to his father alone without arousing suspicion, and he practiced what he was going to say in his head.

Then his phone rang from an unknown caller. "Hello? Bianchi?"

"Are you on your way home?" There was a strain in her voice. She sounded tired.

"Y-yeah, is there something wrong?"

"No, no, I just thought you should know in advance-your mother, she lost her patience. She questioned Iemitsu about all of the injuries you've gotten, and everyone lying to her so much. Iemitsu broke down and told her the truth.

"She knows everything, Tsuna."


	25. She Knows Everything

**Target 25: She Knows Everything**

Nana set a kettle to boil as Iemitsu twiddled his thumbs at the kitchen table.

"So. How's Tsuna doing in his classes?" Iemitsu said.

"He's doing very well!" she said cheerfully. "He's applying himself so much more, he's been studying hard for a big test in science coming up soon, and he's showing interest in what he's learning!"

"Really? Huh."

"I, I am a little concerned for him, though," she said quietly. Iemitsu leaned forward in his seat. "Lately, he's just seemed so stressed, beyond what a teenage boy should be feeling. But he spends time with his friends, budgets his time, gets plenty of sleep, is doing well in class, but..."

"Well," he said as he stretched. He recalled what Reborn said about Tsuna being anxious ever since the incident with the Vindice and Fuuta. "Maybe it's girl trouble? Seems like a lot are after my Tsuna!"

Nana wrinkled her nose. "Hm. I don't think so. He's been spending more time around the girls in the neighborhood, but the more I see him around Kyouko-chan the more I think it was just a schoolboy crush. The rest, he just doesn't seem very interested."

"Huh." He tried to think of another excuse. "Is he eating right? I know I get pretty bad when I-"

"Iemitsu," she said, in an abnormally firm tone of voice. "I've been noticing other things with my son, recently. He seemed so close to Enma-kun but as far as I can tell they haven't spoken a word to each other in months. He's got these frown lines between his eyebrows. There will be times when he is with his friends, and I pass by the room and all of the talking just stops, completely. He's always getting hurt, and it's different from clumsiness and what he got from P.E., it's broken bones and concussions and nasty bruising. And it's not just him, all of his friends are getting hurt like that, too."

She came nearer to him and gently pressed her hand against the back of his shoulder. He winced for the bruising down his back, obtained after being thrown into a brick wall. She must have seen them while he was asleep on the couch earlier.

"A lot of the same kinds of injuries you get, actually. It was an oil pipeline, right?"

There was a sinking feeling in his stomach. "Uh. Think I said construction?" It was the same as an ordinary husband calling himself a paper-pusher, all Nana really knew was that he travelled a lot and worked on-site.

"He lies to me about what he's doing," she continued, "Trying to hide it or soothe a guilty conscience by being vague and evasive. But he never smiles while he does it, you know? Not like you."

"Nana, please, let's just go back to-"

"Don't!" she cried, and then softly, "Don't. I know you think I'm stupid, Iemitsu. I know that you tell me absurd things because you think I would't understand or wouldn't approve, and I've been fine with that, but not when my son is getting hurt because his father is getting him involved with whatever it is!"

Maybe bringing Tsuna to Italy would have more advantages than he realized. He stood up slowly, as though with much effort, supporting himself with one hand on the back of the chair. "Alright, Nana, alright. I won't involve him anymore."

"No, I want to know what's going on," she said sternly. "Because until I do, I can't-" Her voice broke, and she sounded on the verge of tears. "I can't _trust_ you, Iemitsu. If you can't explain to me, and I'll know if you're lying we've been married for too long to not be able to tell, if you can't explain, then..."

"What, you'll kick me out of _my_ house?" he said quietly. Nana heard him and took a step back from him, and he felt a twist in his gut at her fear.

"Please," she said weakly.

He closed his eyes, and took a seat on the counter. "Alright. You win. I'll tell you." He was running through plans in his head. He would need to pull some strings to get a student with test scores as abysmal as Tsuna's into St. Gestus High School in Milan, but Tsuna could start there as soon as January.

She did not sit, but she did look at him.

"You know the business I have told you I work for, Vocentro? That is a real company, and it is the business which gives me a paycheck. But I'm not a construction worker or any such; I'm the chief executive for a law firm on retainer to Vocentro."

"A lawyer?"

"I am not, but I have advocates working for me. This is not a dangerous job. However, Vocentro is the public face for another organization. It is called the Vongola, and it is one of the most powerful crime families in all of Europe."

Nana listened to everything he had to say, feeling sick and wishing she had been wrong, that she had been reading too much into it or she was paranoid and her son was fine and her husband wasn't putting her son in danger.

* * *

When Tsuna returned to the house, his father was sitting on the stoop, smoking with a stone-faced expression. Tsuna looked uncomfortable and guilty as he entered and approached his mother. She sat at the dining room table, her expression haunted. Her eyes looked strained, and she looked tired. He took the nearly-full cup of lukewarm tea from her and dumped it out in the sink.

"Would you like some fresh tea, mom?"

"Oh, my baby boy!" she cried as she leapt up and threw her arms around him, sobbing, when did he get so tall when did he get so serious? She had been so pleased that he was trying that she had turned a blind eye to everything wrong, to the bruises and the lies and she felt sick with herself. "I'm sorry, I'm s-so, s-" She hiccuped.

"Mom, I'm okay," Tsuna said hesitantly. "Really, you don't have to apologize. I'm the one who's been lying to you. They told me it'd be safer if you weren't involved, but...I shoulda been able to think for myself."

She shook her head and released her death grip on her son only with great reluctance. "Tsu-kun, you are fifteen years old. You should not have to worry about criminals, you should be having fun with your friends, living, not, not all of this." She wiped at her eyes. "You are my young man, my son, none of this should have happened."

"I'm sorry, mom."

"You and your friends...your friends," she said, as something seemed to dawn on her. "They've been pulled into this, too?"

Tsuna felt ill. "Gokudera-kun was already working as a hitman, and Lambo, the group that had custody of him was a family called the Bovino, but, yeah. I'm dragging everyone else down with me."

"Oh, Tsu-kun."

"It's almost funny. I wouldn't have made any friends if Reborn never showed up, but they keep on getting hurt cause they know me. Gokudera-kun keeps putting himself in danger cause he thinks he owes me his life, and Fuuta ran away and almost got kidnapped by yakuza cause he was afraid I would hurt him, and Lambo, when he got hurt last year? Lambo..." The memory of Lambo struggling to breathe floated to the top of his mind. _The Death Heater._ One after another, he saw in his mind's eye Gokudera and Bianchi and Hibari being possessed and their bodies being pushed to the breaking point, Chrome's abdomen collapsing and her crying out for help, Sasagawa falling to his knees and dragged away in chains, Yamamoto laying in a hospital bed comatose and paralyzed for pride and sin.

 _They just keep getting hurt cause of me,_ he thought, as his mother hugged him again.

* * *

There were details left out and questions left unanswered for the sake of a better story. That's what Tsuna figured, anyways.

"You said, it started with Reborn-kun?"

"Uh, uh-huh. I don't know how much I should tell you, cause, it's not really my story to tell? But, Reborn isn't really a kid, mom. There's, um, the world is really, really weird, and he's been a part of the underworld for a long time, and he's worked for the Ninth for a long time, so the Ninth sent him to teach me how to become a mafia boss."

Nana had to sit down again to process this. "Everyone in my house is a mobster except for me."

"Well no," Tsuna said, and he jumped when his mother looked up at him. "I mean, not everyone. Fuuta is an esper, he can make perfect rankings of anything, and it's criminals who want his rankings so he asked me to protect him. I-pin, she's technically in training to become an assassin, but I think she just wants to grow up a civilian, yaknow? Go to school here in Japan. And kinda the same for Lambo, he just wants to play games with everyone and eat sweets, y'know? He loves you so much, mom."

Nana smiled softly "I know. Lambo-kun, and Fuuta-kun and I-pin-chan, oh, everyone, and your friends, too, you all bring so much light into my life." She reached into the pocket of her apron and pulled out an envelope, which she showed to Tsuna. "The application for the adoption went through. It's why your father is in town, we're going up to Tokyo next week to finalize the paperwork."

"That's great, mom!" The Ninth certainly hadn't lied about the speed of it. "He's gonna be really happy when he hears."

She replaced the envelope in her pocket. "Alright." She took a deep breath stood up, and clapped her hands together. "Alright, back to what I'm good at! I need to speak to everyone, I'll go get dinner going, is your father still outside?"

Getting back to something familiar and finding comfort in it. Tsuna went to the front door and looked outside. "Nah, he's gone."

"Okay! Then that's seven as usual, could you make up seven place settings, Tsu-kun? And tell everyone dinner will be ready in half an hour."

* * *

Bianchi had heard the entirety of the argument, and wanted to hit Iemitsu with her worst poison cooking for daring to threaten his wife. Calling it his house when he was never there; of course, he would never force Nana out of the house, for all his faults he did love her, and he thought that he loved his son, but a threat he would never carry out was a threat all the same. And Nana did love him, even now.

Bianchi also knew better than to so much as look at Iemitsu funny, after all the stories about the Young Lion that she had heard. She wouldn't stand a chance. He probably wouldn't kill her, it would risk alienating her brother. And he didn't kill when he had other options. Iemitsu and Tsuna were strangely alike in that way, they both turned former enemies into allies, but the difference was that Tsuna showed empathy to his foes and attracted allies with his charisma, while Iemitsu generally relied on blackmail. Take Rokudou Mukuro; she could imagine how it went, being asked to represent Tsuna during the Ring Battles in exchange for the freedom of his subordinates. Sawada Iemitsu killed only if he was ordered to, or if that person was completely uncontrollable.

Nana had a few new rules, once everyone was around for dinner. No more lies from anyone. A long, rambling, painful few sentences that summed up to a prohibition on taking contracts on somebody's life while one lived in her house. You had to be at least 18 to drink alcohol, and you had to be at least four feet tall to consume caffeine.

Tsuna was practically cackling, Reborn looked like he wanted to say something crude, and Nana informed them that she would be very disappointed if anyone helped the kids get around the prohibition. "I do not care when anyone was actually born," Nana said, in a statement that was absolutely directed at Reborn, "but caffeine will stunt your growth. Am I understood? Good.

"The last thing I have to say is this: all of you will always be able to find a home here. All of you are family to me." She clapped her hands together. "Okay, then! Let's eat!"

* * *

 _Cultural Notes: Gestus is the name of one of the thieves who was crucified next to Christ. Dismas was the name given to the repentant thief, who confessed and was raised up to heaven, and Gestus is the name of the unrepentant thief. As you may guess, Gestus is never actually referred to as a Saint._

* * *

 _A/N: This is about the fifth version of this chapter that I have written. Originally, there was going to be a scene with Nana asking how her son was able to fight against such powerful people, but it didn't fit anywhere in the final version. So, I'll tell you now that in my own little world, Nana has a Sky Flame. Sun, Lightning, Storm, Mist, Cloud, Rain, she understands and accepts all of them._

 _Thanks for sticking with me, guys. Waning interest, engineering school, procrastination. It's, uh, been a messy time, but I do still want to finish Flame of Day. So, until next time._


	26. Deal With It

**Target 26: Deal With It**

Tsuna walked the halls of the villa, and it wasn't old and decrepit but as vibrant and alive as it was in its prime. His footsteps echoed. Somewhere far away a piano played.

He stopped in front of a mirror; he was older, stronger, his eyes metallic and a black cape over his shoulders, it was surely Tsuna. In his gaze there was an icy-cold cruelty that he knew from the faces of his worst enemies. Somewhere in the back of his mind he knew something was wrong, but he was silent.

 _There,_ and he moved to catch the figure slinking up behind him, pulled him around and threw him into the mirror, and the glass shattered. Only as the knife came at him did he see red hair and red eyes, and everything was burning flames.

He moved like a ghost through the hall as the villa decayed around him, but the piano played on. He followed the sound through endless passages, pushed the door open, and

The alarm clock was going off.

Tsuna slowly peeled himself out of bed. He was alone in his room. He stretched and shed his pajama shirt. Pants for school weren't a problem, he had plenty of slacks, but with all the excitement over the past few days his uniform shirts had not been washed. He grabbed a shirt off the top of the hamper, sniffed it, and deemed it acceptable.

As he packed up his school supplies he could hear the kids downstairs, mostly Lambo carrying on. It was weird, knowing that by the end of this weekend Lambo would officially be his brother. He wondered whether Lambo would start calling himself Sawada instead of Bovino, and that led to wondering what would happen with his citizenship. Japanese law did not allow dual citizenship, so if being adopted qualified him for Japanese citizenship, Lambo would have to choose to drop either his Japanese or Italian citizenship when he came of age.

That brought Tsuna's thoughts around to his own citizenship, which was a little weird, the idea of becoming an Italian citizen and being a foreigner in his own homeland. He wasn't even sure how one became a citizen of a European country. He went to the computer for a moment to look it up, and among many complicated Latin words he found two relevant ones: "Jus Sanguinis," meaning that if you could prove you had an Italian ancestor within three generations on your mother's side or any number of generations on your father's side, you could claim Italian citizenship by right of blood.

Tsuna rubbed his eyes, and as he went downstairs he tried to put it out of his mind. It wouldn't be an issue for a few more years, whereas his science test was coming up in a few hours.

He made a bowl of cereal, and as he ate he glanced over a page of notes. There was no sign of Iemitsu in the house, and in fact he had not seen much of his father since being confronted for his secrets. When he saw his mother he asked her if she had seen him.

"No, and I would really like to speak to him about all of this," she said, huffing in frustration. "I have no idea what he's been doing. Besides avoiding me, of course."

Tsuna stirred his cereal around listlessly.

"Are you ready for your test?"

"I think so."

Nana frowned. She knew that Tsuna wanted to do well, and she wanted him to do well, too, but learning about this business that had been happening right under her nose had also forced her to acknowledge that she had not been the best mother. "Well, whatever happens, I'm proud of you for trying so hard. Even if you don't do as well as you like, we'll figure something out."

"Okay, mom."

"I'm going to make you a special lunch box, so you have something to look forward to after your test."

Tsuna stopped stirring and perked up curiously. "What's so special about it?"

With a shining smile and a sing-song voice, she said, "It's made with lots of love!" and ducked into the kitchen to finish up everyone's lunches.

Tsuna felt himself smiling, too. It had always been of little comfort before, but it really was true that no matter what happened, his mom would still be there.

And hey, no matter how it went, at least he would never have to deal with Nezu again.

* * *

 ** _Milan, Italy_**

"If I ever have to deal with either of those bastards again it'll be too soon," Maria murmured as she walked the halls of her family's HQ in Milan. She spoke of Dante di Adamo, who was a fool who had attacked her and reduced her to a sobbing mess, and Iemitsu Sawada, who butted into business that did not involve him.

To Maria's right, Luca, overprotective as he had been constantly lately; to her left, Gabriela Maties, an Andorran woman who had been the heir to a cartel that the Vongola had annihilated. Like Maria's attitude toward the father who was cruel to her and was killed by the Vongola, Maties had no lost love for the organization that had bled the land dry, but it still left a healthy fear of crossing the Vongola.

Maria looked tired. She hadn't slept enough this week. Dante's power had left lingering traces in nightmares and, during the first few days, hallucinations.

"Boss," Gabriela said, and she shared a pained look with Luca. "Perhaps you shouldn't push yourself so soon. It hasn't been very long since..."

"Not now," Maria said shortly. "Hold that thought for just a minute."

It was frustrating but fair, when they were still walking through the Milan HQ, where nine in ten employees were civilians. Only the Family's inner circle knew the real nature of what happened to their boss; anybody else, including the press, was told that the Noble Company's CEO, Maria Gaspare, had suffered a seizure. The hit to stock prices was painful, but on the upside a few hangers-on from her father's era had sold their stock, and with it their little control over the family. Little did they know that the brokers were in Maria's pocket, and she bought up the shares to reinforce her position.

The employee gym was closed during the day, but Maria had a key that opened any door in the building. When Maria and her associates entered, the lights were on, the exercise equipment had been moved aside, and several mats had been set out. Across the room, a man in sparring pads leaned against the wall, looking at his phone.

"Bart, I don't pay you to play with your phone," Maria chided.

"You don't pay me at all," Bartolomeo said, slipped his phone into his pocket, and threw his arms up theatrically. He was older, but not old; around forty, but going gray prematurely, clean-shaven, and American, not that you would know it from his perfect Italian accent. "Where my money for the Munich job, huh?"

Gabriela was insulted on behalf of her boss, who was smiling playfully. "Don't talk to Ms. Gaspare that way, you're nothing but a glorified delivery boy!"

"Always good to see you too, Gaby, love what you've done with your hair," Bartolomeo said. He got a sour look in return. Gabriela had kept her hair buzzed short for as long as any of them had known her, and she wasn't impressed, even though she knew he was just trying to be aggravating.

"I'm sorry for the delay, you will of course be paid promptly," Maria said, and as she spoke she pulled out her own phone and sent a text to her assistant. "It will be wired to the usual account shortly, and a bit extra as a token of my appreciation for your patience."

"You are too kind, boss. And after what I have heard, the rumors are flying, you know?"

Maria's mood dropped a notch, her mouth drawing into a thin line. "You shouldn't gossip, Bartolomeo, it's unbecoming of you."

"Am I not allowed to worry for my boss? Even if it was only a seizure as the news says, and we both know you didn't have a seizure."

Luca shifted his weight and glared at Bartolomeo, and Gabriela's power bubbled just under the surface. Maria put a hand up to signal them to hold.

Bartolomeo drew a curved knife with a guarded edge, and Maria shrugged out of her suit jacket and pulled a baton the length of her forearm from her shoulder harness.

Both stepped onto the mats that made a makeshift ring, and Maria charged. It was all Bartolomeo could do to slide to the side and take a swing at her open side, but she dropped to the floor and swept his legs out from under him. He barely seemed to brush the ground before he kipped up and struck again, and Maria swept his blade aside with her baton.

As her arm went aside and she was left open, Bartolomeo sucker-punched Maria in the stomach.

She fell back a step, gasping for breath, but kept on her feet. He feinted for her stomach and she fell for it, and as she jerked back he stomped on her foot. He moved around her, grabbed her by the hair and yanked hard enough to pull her off her feet. She hit the floor flat on her back and despite the padding she clutched at the back of her head in pain.

Bartolomeo took a step back and flourished his knife. "One to zero, boss."

"I'm well aware!" she snapped, but it was less anger at him and more frustration at herself. She pushed herself up off the floor.

They went again, Maria's simmering anger fueling her strikes until she put Bartolomeo on the ground, and dropped him a second time, and he returned it with a strike that would have crippled if the edge were not guarded. The rounds blurred into each other, Maria burning hot and hotter each time she hit the floor, while Bartolomeo just seemed colder with each round.

This was nothing new. While he was technically in the lower part of the family's hierarchy, he was highly skilled, perceptive, and strong. He was trusted by Maria, and he was also one of the few people in the family who could keep up with her.

The hits got harder on each side, but where Maria got faster, Bartolomeo slowed down, taking his time and conserving his energy to last as long as he could, but slowing down all the same. Still, he knocked her down again.

"Maybe we should call it a draw, boss," he said, and was dismayed to see her peeling herself up again and grabbing her baton. "You'll get hurt like this."

"I'll be fine," she said shortly. "Come on, again."

"Ma'am, please," Gabriela said. "This is pushing it."

 _"_ Boss _,"_ Luca grunted, and that he vocalized it indicated his concern.

"I'm fine!" Maria insisted, and she ran straight for Bartolomeo.

His first instinct was to duck, brace, and drive her back over his shoulder and into the ground again, but Maria was smarter than that, and he knew it. She didn't do wild charges that would never succeed.

Instead of a direct counter, Bartolomeo tightened his abdominal muscles and took the hit, and it hurt as Maria struck him across the stomach, but it also put him in position to grab Maria by the wrist. She stomped on his foot and dug her nails into his skin, but he didn't let up. He said, very quietly, "What happened, Maria?"

"Let go of me!" she snapped, and he let go.

Bartolomeo tossed his knife off to the side. "What are you looking to accomplish here, boss?"

"Pick up your weapon!"

"What happened?" he said. He looked past Maria to Luca and Gabriela. "What happened?" he said again.

"Don't speak of me like I'm not here!" Maria snapped.

"Then answer my question, boss."

As Bartolomeo looked at her sternly, Maria flinched back. She could feel dead eyes on her, and for a moment, she flashed back to the shrieking accusations, ' _It's your fault I'm dead!'_ She clapped a hand over her mouth to restrain a sob.

"Madame," Gabriela said softly, and Bartolomeo backed off as Gabriela approached and offered a hand to Maria. Maria took it, allowing herself to be led to a bench off to the side. She held up a hand to signal for them to hold off for a moment as she gathered her thoughts.

"All three of you know the family's history?" she said finally. "The Angelo, split down the middle by my grandfather and great-aunt. We stayed here, in Milan; Adamo's First went to Renatti. Both too weak to pose a threat to the Vongola, but given our history it was natural we were still on their radar. When the Berlin Wall fell, all of Adamo the Second's assets in the Eastern bloc went kaput, and the family never quite recovered. His son, Dante, has been scrambling to fix their finances for a while; I figured they would be selling off their assets within the next few years to fend off their debtors. Then, out of the clear blue sky, Dante asks to meet me."

As she related the events of the meeting, Bartolomeo looked more and more angry, while Maria spoke with a steady voice.

"I saw Dante's ring light with a Flame," Maria said, and Luca nodded in understanding. "It is the family's power; they say that with a mere touch, Dante's grandfather could drive men to madness. I didn't know what, exactly, Dante intended to do to Sawada, but if he laid a hand him, Sawada would readily use it as an excuse to retaliate against _my_ family. Anyone who knew Dante's late wife knew that she had been a militant pacifist, she spoke of it extensively the one time we met, and I tried to appeal to that; instead, he was angered that I invoked Lilith's name, and attacked me.

"I would greatly prefer that it not come down to war, as you well know. Gang wars weaken both sides, catch civilians in the middle, draw the attention of the police, and risk the Vindice coming down on everyone's heads. But, I fear that Dante may be cracking under the pressure, and if he acts rashly we cannot lie back and take it. And if it does come to war, I would rather you know what we are up against. Gabriela, I would ask you to tell the others this."

Gabriela nodded, understanding 'others' as the other upper executives of the family. "Of course, madame."

"When Dante touched me, my mind was overcome with images of death. It was like a waking nightmare. I saw all of you, my dearest family, dead, and I was certain that it was my fault. I was paralyzed with terror, and could not fight back. I-" Her voice broke, and her eyes were welling up with tears. Maria put a hand over her mouth again. "A touch," she said. "That's all he needs, but he needs that much. I don't know if it is possible to resist the effect once it has taken hold-all of you can see the lingering effect his power has had on me-but the question becomes irrelevant if he never gets close enough to touch you."

"It's a good thing none of us are best at close-quarters," Bartolomeo said sardonically, and got a hint of a smile from Maria. "Mm-hm. Is there anything else we should know about them, boss?"

Maria closed her eyes as she thought. "The Angelo Family had control over several powerful artifacts during its height, just as the Vongola still has, though I would need to refer to my grandfather's journals to know which were lost and which went with the Adamo in the schism, aside from the boss's ring which Dante now wears, the fool."

Luca reached back and touched the gavel-shaped war hammer he wore on his back, and then signed, 'You want?'

"Heh. I think I'll have to turn you down on that one, my friend. Unfortunately, I don't think I would be able to use that weapon to its full potential."

Luca shrugged. 'OK. I'll beat Dante for you,' he signed, using the letter 'D' and the sign for 'stupid'.

"Only if he attacks you first, Luca, I'm not starting a fight. For now, keep a close eye out. Knowing you, you will want to research the family's artifacts, am I right?" He nodded. "You may have full access to my personal library to begin your research. Gabriela, speak to the others about what I have told you. Bartolomeo-"

"Yes, boss?"

"Go talk to Samson, he should have some work for you. If that's alright, of course."

Samson was Vice President of Operations for the Noble Company, and the head of the Eva Family's small assassination squad. At nearly sixty years old, he was looking at retirement sometime in the next few years. Both he and Maria were looking at Bartolomeo to potentially be Samson's successor.

"Of course, boss, I am only too happy to help."

"Alright, then, to work." Maria frowned, looked at the ground, and stood up. "Thank you for talking some sense into me. I am eternally grateful to have friends, family, as good as all of you."

Bartolomeo grinned, Gabriela smiled a little and nodded, and Luca clapped Maria on the shoulder. Her knees nearly buckled from the force of it.

* * *

 _16\. Balance the chemical equation. Completely rewrite the chemical equation with the correct coefficients in the space below. (10pts)_

 _S + HNO_ _3 (=)_ _H_ _2_ _SO_ _4_ _\+ NO_ _2_ _\+ H_ _2_ _O_

Tsuna wrote out the symbols for each of the four elements in a vertical column and wrote the number of atoms of each on each side of the equation, then stared at the problem for about thirty seconds, and decided he would come back to it when he finished with the rest.

When he finished with the rest of the problems, he returned to number 16. He stared at it for a minute, then another minute. Half of the class had already turned in their test; next to him, Yamamoto stood up and took his test up to the front.

 _Come on, I can do this._ He experimentally put a number in, but that wouldn't work, there would only ever be an even number of Hydrogen atoms on the right side- _wait!_ It hit him like a bolt from the blue, and he scratched down, "Coeff. of HNO3  must be even." That was a starting point, he thought.

Tsuna tried putting in a 4, and spent a good two minutes trying to balance the equation from there, but it came out as an unworkable mess. He erased what he had and started from the beginning, and put in a 6 in front of HNO3. _That's 6 H's, 6 N's, 18 O's, and I can balance the N's on the right side with 6NO_ _2_ _, which makes 6 N's and 17 O's, and...and four? Yeah, a two in front of H_ _2_ _O makes 6 H's, 6 N's, and 18 O's, and one S on each side!_

He checked his addition because he did not trust himself in that regard, and it came out correct again; he rewrote the entire thing neatly in the space, checked that he had written his name on the first page, and turned his test into the front. Nezu gave him a dirty look, but Tsuna found it difficult to care when he was actually feeling pretty good about a science test.

The rest of the school day passed uneventfully; he went up to the reception room at the end of the day, only to learn that Hibari was out, so he went home. As he walked through the gate in front of the school, his phone buzzed with a text message from his father saying that he would pick Tsuna up tomorrow morning to go into town. No question, no request, just fact of the matter. Well, maybe he could convince his father to talk to his mother.

 _Cause I really wanted to spend my Saturday morning shopping downtown with my dad, geez._


End file.
